Immoral (3 page)

Stride smiled. Maggie was the smartest cop he had ever worked with. “Graeme’s her stepfather, right? What about her natural father? I think his name was Tommy.”

“Nice try. I thought about that, too. But he’s deceased.”

“Anyone else missing? Like a boyfriend?”

“No reports. If she ran off, she either did it alone or with someone from out of town.”

“People who run off need transportation,” Stride said.

“We’re checking the airport and bus station here and in Superior.”

“Neighbors see anything?”

Maggie shook her head. “So far, nothing of interest. We’re still doing interviews.”

“Any complaints involving this girl?” Stride asked. “Stalking, rape, anything like that?”

“Guppo ran the database,” Maggie said. “Nothing involving Rachel. Go back a few years, and you’ll find Emily and her first husband—Rachel’s father—in a few scrapes.”

“Like what?”

“Father was often drunk and disorderly. One domestic abuse report, never formally charged. He hit his wife, not his daughter.”

Stride frowned. “Do we know if Rachel and Kerry knew each other?”

“Rachel’s name never came up last year,” Maggie said. “But we’ll ask around.”

Stride nodded blankly. He put himself in Rachel’s shoes again, re-creating her last night, tracing what may or may not have happened along the way. He assumed she made it home on Friday. She was in her car, and now her car was at home. Then what? Did she go inside the house? Was someone waiting for her? Did she go out again? It was sleeting and cold—she would have taken the car. Unless someone picked her up.

“Time to talk to the Stoners,” Stride said. Then he paused. He was used to relying on Maggie’s instinct. “What’s your gut tell you, Mags? Runaway or something worse?”

Maggie didn’t hesitate. “With her car still parked outside the house? Sounds like something worse. Sounds like Kerry.”

Stride sighed. “Yeah.”

Stride rang the doorbell. He saw a shadow through the frosted glass and heard the click of footsteps. The carved oak door swung inward. A man about Stride’s height, smartly attired in a V-neck cashmere sweater, a white dress shirt with button-down collar, and crisply pleated tan slacks, extended his hand. In his other hand, he swirled the ice in his drink.

“You’re Lieutenant Stride, is that right?” the man greeted him. His handshake was solid, and he had the easy smile of someone accustomed to country club cocktail parties. “Kyle told us you would be arriving shortly. I’m Graeme Stoner.”

Stride nodded in acknowledgment. He got the message. Kyle was Kyle Kinnick, Duluth’s deputy chief of police and Stride’s boss. Graeme wanted to make sure Stride understood the juice he had at city hall.

He noted the discreet wrinkles creeping along Graeme’s forehead and around the corners of his mouth and calculated that the man was about his own age. His chocolate brown hair was trimmed short, an executive’s haircut. He wore silver glasses with tiny circular rims. His face was broad and soft, without noticeable cheekbones or a protruding chin. Even late at night, Graeme’s beard line was almost invisible, which caused Stride involuntarily to rub his palm against his own scratchy stubble.

Graeme put a hand on Stride’s shoulder. “Let me show you to the den,” he said. “I’m afraid the living room felt rather exposed with the crowd outside.”

Stride followed Graeme into the living room, furnished with delicate sofas and antiques, all in brilliantly varnished walnut. Graeme pointed at a mirror-backed china cabinet, stocked with crystal. “May I offer you a drink? It needn’t be alcoholic.”

“No, I’m fine, thanks.”

Graeme paused in the middle of the room and appeared momentarily uncomfortable. “I must apologize for not raising concerns with you earlier, Lieutenant. When Kevin stopped by on Saturday night, I really wasn’t troubled at all that Rachel hadn’t come home. Kevin gets very excitable about Rachel, you see, and I thought he was overreacting.”

“But you don’t think so now,” Stride said.

“It’s been two days. And my wife rightly reminded me about that other girl who disappeared.”

Graeme led the way through the main dining room and then through French doors into a sprawling den, warmed by a gray marble fireplace on the east wall. The white carpet was lush and spotless. The north wall was framed entirely in full-length windows, except for two stained glass doors that led to the darkness of a back garden. A series of brass lanterns, mounted at intervals on each of the other walls, lit the room with a pale glow.

To the right of the garden wall, one on either side of the fireplace, sat two huge matching recliners. Lost in one was a woman holding a bell-shaped glass of brandy.

The woman nodded at Stride from the chair without getting up. “I’m Emily Stoner, Rachel’s mother,” she said softly.

Emily was a few years younger than Graeme, but not a trophy bride. Stride could see she had once been very pretty, although she hadn’t aged gracefully. Her blue eyes were tired, overly made up, with shadows underneath. Her dark hair was short and straight and hadn’t been washed. She wore a plain navy sweater and blue jeans.

Seated near Emily on the hearth, holding the woman’s left hand, was a man in his late forties, with graying hair combed to protect a thinning hairline. The man got up and shook Stride’s hand, leaving behind a clammy residue that Stride tried unobtrusively to rub away. “Hello, Lieutenant. My name is Dayton Tenby. I’m the minister at Emily’s church. Emily asked me to be with them this evening.”

Graeme Stoner took a chair near the garden windows. “I’m sure you have many questions for us. We’ll tell you everything we know, which I’m afraid isn’t much. Incidentally, let’s get the unpleasantness out of the way up front. My wife and I had absolutely no involvement in Rachel’s disappearance, but we understand that you have to clear the family in these kinds of situations. Naturally, we’ll cooperate in every way we can, including taking polygraphs, if necessary.”

Stride was surprised. Usually this was the ugly part—letting the family know that they were suspects. “To be candid, yes, we do like to run polygraph tests on the family.”

Emily looked at Graeme nervously. “I don’t know.”

“It’s routine, dear,” Graeme said. “Lieutenant, just send your questions to Archibald Gale. He’ll be representing our interests in this matter. We can do it tomorrow if you’d like.”

Stride grimaced. So much for cooperation. Archie Gale was the most feared criminal defense lawyer in northern Minnesota, and Stride had tangled with the suave old goat many times from the witness stand.

“Do you feel it’s necessary to have a lawyer involved?” Stride asked, his voice chillier.

“Don’t misunderstand,” Graeme replied, as calmly and cordially as before. “We have nothing to hide. Even so, in this day and age, it would be reckless of us not to retain counsel.”

“Are you willing to talk to me now, without Gale present?”

Graeme smiled. “Archie is flying back from Chicago. He reluctantly agreed we could review the facts without him.”

Reluctantly. Stride knew Gale, and that was probably an understatement. But he wasn’t about to lose his chance—it might be the last opportunity to talk to the family without an attorney screening every word.

Stride slid a notebook from his back pocket and uncapped a pen. Immediately on his left was a rolltop desk. He pulled a swivel chair out from behind the desk and sat down.

“When did you see Rachel last?” Stride asked.

“Friday morning before she went to school,” Graeme said.

“Did she take her car then?”

“Yes. It was gone when I arrived home Friday night.”

“But you didn’t hear her return overnight?”

“No. I was in bed by ten. I’m a sound sleeper. I never heard a thing.”

“What did you do on Saturday?”

“I was in the office most of the day. That’s typical.”

“Mrs. Stoner, were you at home during this time?”

Emily, who had been staring into the fire, looked back, startled. She took a long swallow of brandy, and Stride wondered how much she had already had to drink. “No. I only got back early this afternoon.”

“And where were you?”

She took a moment to focus. “I was driving back from St. Louis. My sister moved down there several years ago. I started home Saturday morning, but I was too tired by evening to go the rest of the way. I stayed overnight in Minneapolis and got into town around noon.”

“Did you talk to Rachel while you were gone?”

Emily shook her head.

“Did you call home at all?”

She hesitated. “No.”

“When did you start getting worried?”

“After Emily got home,” Graeme answered. “We still hadn’t heard from Rachel, so we started calling her friends. No one had seen her.”

“Who did you call?”

Graeme rattled off several names, and Stride jotted them down in his notebook. “We also called people from the school,” Graeme added. “And several of the clubs and restaurants her friends mentioned. No one had seen her.”

“Does she have a boyfriend?” Stride asked.

Emily looked up. She pushed a lock of hair from her face. Her voice was weary. “Rachel goes through lots of boyfriends. They don’t last.”

“Is she sexually active?”

“At least since she was thirteen,” Emily said. “I walked in on her once with a boy.”

“But no one special?”

Emily shook her head.

“Have you checked with relatives? People she might go to?”

“We don’t have any relatives here. Both my parents are dead, and Graeme is from out of town. There’s no one but us.”

Stride wrote:
How did these two hook up
?

“Mrs. Stoner, what kind of relationship do you have with your daughter?”

Emily paused. “We’ve never been very close. When she was little, she was her daddy’s girl. I was the wicked witch.”

Dayton Tenby frowned. “That’s not fair, Emily.”

“Well, that’s what it felt like,” Emily snapped. She spilled a little of the brandy and dabbed at her sweater with her fingers. “When her father died, Rachel drifted even further away. I hoped when I married Graeme, we might start becoming a family again. But as she’s gotten older, it’s only gotten worse.”

“What about you, Mr. Stoner?” Stride asked. “How is your relationship with Rachel?”

Graeme shrugged. “We were relatively close right after Emily and I got married five years ago, but as Emily said, she’s grown more distant as she’s gotten older. Today it’s the same. Cold.”

“We tried to reach her,” Emily said. “Graeme bought her that car last year. I guess it seemed to her like we were trying to buy her love, and I suppose we were. But it didn’t help.”

“Has she ever talked about running away?”

“Not in a long time,” Emily said. “I suppose it sounds crazy, but I always thought she felt she could cause more trouble for us by staying around and making us miserable. It gave her a cruel sense of satisfaction.”

“Was she suicidal?” Stride asked.

“Never. Rachel would never have killed herself.”

“Why are you so sure?” Stride asked.

“Rachel liked herself too much. She was always cocky and confident. It was us she despised. Or me.” Emily shook her head.

“Mr. Stoner, did anything happen while your wife was gone? An argument, a fight, anything like that?”

“No, nothing. She ignored me. That was routine.”

“Did she mention meeting anyone new?”

“No, but I don’t suppose she would have told me even if she had.”

“Did you notice unusual cars in the driveway or on the street? Or see her with anyone you didn’t recognize?”

Graeme shook his head.

“What about your personal situation, Mr. Stoner? You work for the Range Bank, is that correct?”

Graeme nodded. “I’m the executive vice president for the bank’s operations in Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, and the Dakotas.”

“Have you received any threats at home or at work? Strange phone calls?”

“Not that I recall.”

“You’ve never felt in danger?”

“No, not at all.”

“Is your income at the bank widely known?”

Graeme frowned. “Well, I suppose it’s not a secret. I have to file as an officer with the SEC, so it’s a matter of public record. But it’s not the kind of thing that makes the papers.”

“And you’ve received no contact of any kind that would lead you to believe Rachel has been kidnapped.”

“No, nothing,” Graeme told him.

Stride flipped his notebook shut. “I think that’s everything for the moment. I’ll need to talk with you further, of course, as the investigation continues. And I’ll be in touch with Mr. Gale.”

Emily opened her mouth, then closed it. She obviously wanted to interrupt.

“What is it?” Stride asked.

“It’s just that—well, it’s one reason we were so concerned. The reason I insisted Graeme call Kyle.”

“Kerry McGrath,” Tenby murmured.

“She lived so close,” Emily exclaimed. “She went to the same school.”

Stride waited until Emily looked back at him, and he held her stare, putting as much compassion as he could in his eyes. “I won’t lie to you. We’ll be looking for connections to Kerry’s disappearance. We would be remiss if we didn’t. But just because there are surface similarities doesn’t mean that Rachel being missing has anything to do with Kerry.”

Emily sniffled loudly. She nodded her head, but her eyes shone with tears.

“If I can answer any questions for you, please call me,” Stride said, extracting a card from his coat and placing it on the rolltop desk.

Dayton Tenby rose from his place near the fire and smiled at Stride. “Let me show you out.”

The minister guided Stride back through the house. Tenby was a nervous, effeminate man, who seemed intimidated by the upscale trappings of the Stoner house. He walked gingerly, as if his aging brown wingtips were leaving dirty footprints. He was small, around five-foot-eight, with a narrow chin, tiny brown eyes set closely together, and a pinched nose. Stride sized him up as a holdover from Emily’s past life. BG—Before Graeme.

Stroking his chin, Tenby glanced curiously outside at the lights and crowds gathered there. “They’re like vultures, aren’t they?” he observed.