forgotten (Twisted Cedars Mysteries Book 2) (22 page)

* * *

day 9 after the accident

Wade managed to catch four hours of sleep Saturday night, but he was awakened early the next morning by a call from Detective Waverman.

“Mackay here.” He put on the speakerphone so he could pull on his sweatpants.

“Sorry to call so early. But I wanted to give you the latest update. We finally managed to track down the neighbors who live closest to the Caruthers on the lake.” Waverman sounded tense. Exhausted.

Undoubtedly his team would be working around the clock as long as there was a chance the baby could be alive. “Did they see anything?”

“The husband said he heard a boat motor fire up around midnight, a week ago last Friday. This was pretty unusual, so he got out of bed and looked out the window. He claimed he saw Richard and Joelle drive off in their runabout. He’s pretty sure Joelle had the baby in her arms, but all he had to see by was moonlight, so he can’t be sure.”

“How far from his window to the Caruthers’s dock?”

“About two hundred yards.”

“So he can’t be sure the people were Richard, Joelle and the baby.”

“But he’s sure about the boat.”

“Did he hear them return?”

“No. He claims he went back to bed and didn’t wake up again until morning. By then the boat was back where it belonged. He said everything was quiet when he and his wife left to go to Medford for a week. Their daughter just had a baby.”

Wade went to the kitchen and set the phone on the counter while he put on a pot of coffee. “So midnight on the Friday in question, two people, one possibly holding a baby, took the Caruthers’s boat out on the lake. Have you had a chance to question Richard?”

“He’s sticking to his story that he was home in Ashland by nine o’clock. He says he kept the key to the boat in a drawer at the cottage. And it’s still there. We’ve sent it in to check for fingerprints.”

“So if he’s telling the truth—who was the man in the boat?”

“We’ve been interviewing neighbors, and tracing Joelle’s phone calls. So far nothing. If she was having an affair, she never called the guy. There are no registered offenders in the vicinity. No leads on who this guy could be, other than the obvious.”

Richard Caruthers.

“By the way, Joelle suffered a breakdown at the women’s shelter last night. She’s been admitted into Brookings Medical Center.”

Waverman cursed. “We need her getting better, not worse.”

* * *

Wade showered, got dressed, then took a cup of coffee out to the deck. His mom had been quite the gardener. Every year since she’d left, the yard looked a little sadder. He kept the hedge pruned, lawns moved, and perennial beds weeded, but he lacked the finer skills of staking and dividing. Which meant the delphiniums were bowed like supplicants and the daisies were taking over almost everything else.

Maybe he should be like Dougal. Buy a place in the woods and not bother with all this.

But Wade liked living in town. He enjoyed his neighbors and being able to walk to the Linger Longer from his home if he wished. And normally he found it relaxing to putter around the yard. This summer, though, he hadn’t had much time.

Summer was always a challenging time for law enforcement, thanks to the influx of tourists and outdoor recreationalists. But this summer had been extra brutal.

Ever since Dougal arrived.

Dougal was the one who’d found Daisy Hammond-Quinpool’s remains.

And Dougal had gotten everyone worked up about the librarian murders that occurred in the seventies and a possible connection to Charlotte’s aunt Shirley.

The truck accident and Joelle’s amnesia and missing child was the one serious case that didn’t seem to have any connection to Dougal.

And yet, his book was on Joelle’s nightstand—both at the cottage and in the women’s shelter. And according to Charlotte, Joelle seemed fixated on a need to see Dougal again.

Wade rested his head against the chair and closed his eyes. As he relaxed, he recalled simpler times. The high school years. Back then he and Dougal had been on the same football team, along with Kyle Quinpool who played quarterback. Wade had been the middle line-backer. Dougal the safety. They’d played well together, in fact it had seemed at times like they could read each other’s minds.

Off the field, their relationship had been more complicated.

Wade had always thought Kyle lay at the root of the problem. Confident and entitled, Kyle had been into wild parties, reckless driving and casual hookups behind Daisy’s back. Wade had tried to restrain him, but Dougal had seemed to feed on Kyle’s insanity—at least he had when he was a teenager.

They’d had many a fight over trouble that Kyle started.

But maybe the root of their differences had been deeper.

Recently Dougal had told him that he’d always felt an outsider. He lived in a trailer park on the west side of town. His mom cleaned house for Wade and Kyle’s families. Worse, he had a father who was estranged from the family and serving time for murder.

That had been the real cause of their differences, Wade suspected.

But could any of that history have relevance to what was going on in Twisted Cedars right now?

Wade didn’t see how. Yet, he felt that it might.

* * *

At three in the afternoon Wade was at his office catching up on paperwork, when he got another call from a grim-voiced Detective Waverman.

“We’ve recovered the body of a baby same approximate age, sex and size as Josephine Caruthers.”

The words hit Wade like a punch in the gut. Kids, especially babies, were always the hardest. “Have you got a positive ID?”

“Medical Examiner can’t say for sure. But the father has identified the pajamas she was wearing at the time.”

“Winnie-the Pooh,” Wade recalled.

“That’s right.”

“Cause of death is drowning?”

There was a pause, then Waverman shared a fact that wouldn’t be going public. “That’s for your ears only. We’ll have the preliminary autopsy tomorrow. For now all we’re saying is the body had been in the water for about a week.”

“You’ve got someone notifying the mother?” He thought of Joelle, vulnerable and damaged in her hospital room. How would this news affect her? Would she be protected from pain by her broken-down brain?

Was whatever had happened to Josephine the reason she’d broken down in the first place?

“Any leads on the guy who was driving the boat?”

“We’ve talked to the neighbor again. He says for sure it was a man. But he admits he can’t say for sure it was Richard.”

“How did the husband react when you told him his daughter’s body had been recovered?”

This was a key moment for a trained investigator. If the husband had been guilty, there were numerous ways he might betray himself.

“He broke down and cried.”

Like a normal father.

Like an innocent man.

Then again, Richard Caruthers was in the theatre business. They couldn’t afford to forget that.

day 10 after the accident

m
onday morning Jamie asked Colin Howard if she could talk to him about her future with the firm.

She’d spent most of the weekend thinking about the house on Horizon Hill Road.

Twice she’d driven by it. The third time, she’d gone out and walked the length of the road, studying the houses of the neighbors and trying to decide if she would fit in.

She knew her brother thought she—and their mother—were eternal optimists with a weakness for being too trusting, a soft touch. He blamed their soft hearts for their bad judgment in men. And he’d been proved right on that score.

But what he didn’t seem to appreciate was that she and her mother also shared a realistic streak.

Dougal judged their mother harshly for her casual affairs. Never had it occurred to him that their mother had been protecting them, not letting any man close enough to ever hurt her children.

Their mother had made her own happily ever after her own bad marriage.

Now Jamie had to do the same thing.

“Let’s talk now.” Colin got up to close the door. At fifty-two, Colin was the ‘younger’ of the firm’s two partners. In the past he’d hinted broadly that he could foresee the day when Jamie would be invited to be a full-equity partner, too. She had no idea if the drama in her life over the two months had affected her chances.

She hoped not.

“I’m really grateful you and Ben let me come back to the firm when my marriage ended. But I need to know what you’re prepared to offer for the future.”

“You’re a great asset to the firm.” Ben looked at her with warm brown eyes—they always seemed to be smiling, even when his mouth wasn’t. “Eventually we’d like to see you in a partner role. Down the road.”

“I’m just wondering how far down the road. And if we could get something in writing.”

Colin’s eyebrows went up.

Jamie worried she’d come across as too pushy. “Since I’ve already sold my trailer, I don’t have anywhere to live. I could buy another trailer with my money. But I looked at a house on Horizon Hill Road this weekend. It’s lovely, but I wouldn’t want to buy unless I was sure I had a secure future here.”

Colin nodded approvingly. “A house in that neighborhood would be a good investment for you. Even more importantly, I think it’s a healthy step.”

He hesitated, then sighed. “What Kyle did—we were all shocked Jamie. No one guessed he was capable of something like that. I feel terrible that he managed to deceive you as well.”

Jamie noticed he spoke definitely, as if there were no doubt. Innocent until proven guilty was merely a technicality in this case, and in this town.

Not that she blamed Colin, or anyone else. Kyle had pretty much admitted his guilt, straight to her face. And the facts were difficult to dispute.

“I don’t want to be pitied, Colin. I just want to ensure I’m making a sound financial commitment if I make an offer on this house.”

“Fair enough. You’ve earned nothing but respect in this office. In fact, we’ve were just talking about assigning you a new client—we’ve been approached by a wealthy individual looking for a new tax accountant. Ben and I both agreed you would be perfect.”

This was better than she’d hoped. “Really?”

“Yes. It’s time you started building your own client base. I think it’s fair to say that in five years you would be in position to be named Junior Partner. How does that sound?”

“Excellent. Thanks Colin.” She would call Bailey Landax on her lunch hour. Talk about putting together an offer. Jamie could feel her spirits lifting.

But then Colin shared another piece of news.

“Did you hear Kyle and Jim have put their real estate business on the market? Can’t say I’m surprised. I heard all their clients are asking to be let out of their agreements. Needless to say, they haven’t closed a deal since the news went public.”

“I hadn’t heard.”

“I guess they aren’t expecting the trouble to blow over.”

“No. I don’t think there’s much chance of that happening.”

* * *

Headlines kept distracting Charlotte as she put out the Monday morning editions in the Newspaper and Periodical section of the library.

“Baby’s Body Found in Hyatt Lake.”

“Hopes Die As Baby’s Body Discovered.”

The local Oregon papers had been covering the story of the Caruthers’ missing child all weekend, but on Monday the news went national. Even the
New York Times
and
Washington Post
made mention of it, though not on the front page.

Charlotte read every story, even though they all said essentially the same thing.

And they all played up the bit about the Winnie the Pooh pajamas. The fact that the tiny corpse had been wearing them seemed to leave little room for doubt that the recovered body truly was little Josephine Caruthers.

Charlotte returned to her desk where she added two new titles to her wish list. There were so many great books she wanted to buy for the library this fall—if only she had a bigger acquisitions budget. But as the board kept reminding her, more people came to the library to use the free Wi-Fi than they did to read books now. It was a changing world, and libraries had to change, as well.

“Look at this one!” A skinny girl with light brown hair giggled as she hit the play button on a You Tube video. Her friend, sitting on a chair that had been squished into the same cubicle, leaned forward. “Oh, they’re so cute!”

Casually Charlotte checked the screen as she walked past, and smiled as she saw that the girls were watching a video about cats. The two girls, around age thirteen, had been online for about an hour now. Though the computers were highly protected, Charlotte still liked to keep an eye on them.

At three o’clock all the online news services were beeping with updates on the Caruthers’ case. Preliminary autopsy results confirmed the little girl’s identity and pointed to drowning as the cause of death, probably late Friday night or early Saturday morning.

Charlotte called Dougal. “Did you hear the latest on Joelle’s baby?”

“I just got in from a hike on some old logging roads.”

Which meant the writing wasn’t going well. Again.

Charlotte had initially supported the idea of him writing a fictional mystery. But she was beginning to think Dougal had another calling. One he might hate, but that he couldn’t deny.

“You still there? You said there was news about the baby?”

She relayed the autopsy results. “The reporters are also quoting a neighbor who saw Joelle and her husband take the baby out on the boat around midnight a week ago Friday. Do you think they killed her together?”

“And then Richard goes back to Ashland and resumes working like usual—while Joelle walks down to the highway and hitches a ride with a trucker? Doesn’t make sense.”

“No. It really doesn’t.” She hung up the phone, worried about Joelle, sad for the baby...and worried about Dougal, as well.

* * *

Monday, from start to finish, was crazy at the Curry County Sheriff’s Office.

The trouble started when Laura and Vern Anders of Port Orford were reported missing. Both of their employers phoned the Sheriff’s Office, independently, out of concern when they didn’t show up for work as usual.