Linda Crowder - Jake and Emma 01 - Too Cute to Kill (6 page)

11

Emma was writing case notes for the client who’d just left her office when Kristy buzzed her to let her know Jake was on the phone.  “I only have ten minutes before my next appointment,” she warned when she hear Jake’s cheerless hello.

“I won’t even use five,” he answered.

“You sound grim,” she observed.

“I checked with the Secretary of State’s office on the ownership of the Gerecht Group.  They had a contact person listed in Cheyenne,” he said.

“Well that’s something.”

“No, it isn’t.  When I called, I found out the contact person is simply the registered agent.  He is not involved with the operation of the corporation nor is he willing or obligated to tell me who hired him to serve as the registered agent.”  Jake sighed.

“Is that right?” asked Emma.  “I thought that kind of information was supposed to be public.”

“Only in a publicly held corporation.  Gerecht Group is private, so all they are required to disclose is a registered agent.  The real owners may be out of state or even out of the country, for all we know.”

“That’s crazy,” said Emma with exasperation.  “Therapists practically have to leave a DNA sample with the state and this corporation just has to have a mail drop?”

“Pretty much,” admitted Jake.  “I am in court this afternoon.  What’s your schedule like?”

Emma checked the calendar on her computer.  “I have two more appointments today then an interdisciplinary team meeting for one of my clients.  Want me to start dinner?”

They decided Jake would stop by their favorite Mexican food restaurant, a few blocks from the courthouse, and bring dinner home with him.  Emma returned to her case notes and finished them just as Kristy opened the door to show in her next client.

April Mensa was a new client, referred by Heath House, a domestic violence prevention agency. Emma greeted her warmly and took the new client paperwork from Kristy as her assistant left the office.

As they talked, Emma learned that April had grown up in a violent household.  She’d married at 17 to escape and shortly after became pregnant with her first child.  Neither she nor her new husband had the emotional maturity to cope with the subsequent miscarriage and the marriage had buckled under the strain.

Divorced by 19 and unwilling to return to her parents’ home, April moved in with a friend who introduced her to Ed, the man who became her second husband.  This time her pregnancy resulted in the birth of a beautiful baby boy and Emma smiled over the picture his proud mother showed of her now four year-old son.

April’s second husband was considerably older than she was and worked on the oil rigs that were scattered across Wyoming.  Emma knew that meant he would have been gone for a week or more at a time, then home for a week before leaving for the rigs again.  It was a hard life for a family but the money was good and April had enjoyed being able to stay home with her baby.

When he was home, her husband liked to go to the bars.  Before the baby was born, April would go with him, drinking ginger ale while she was pregnant.  After the baby came, she stayed home.  The couple argued about it, but there wasn’t anyone April felt comfortable leaving her child with until the wee hours so she’d held firm.

The violence started slowly, a fist raised in the heat of an argument; bruises where he’d grabbed her arm.  When he slammed her against the wall and threatened to kill her, she decided to leave.  The next time her husband went to the rigs, April packed her bags and showed up at Heath House.

As they talked, April mentioned that her husband had lost a friend he’d gone to high school with just before Christmas and the close encounter with his own mortality seemed to plunge him into a deep depression.  The violence had escalated after that.

“I told him there weren’t no reason to be so upset and thinking about dying himself,” said April.  “I said to him, ‘Nate was a druggie.  You’re not a druggie,’ but he was really freaked out about it.”

Emma’s heart clutched when she heard the name of April’s husband’s friend.  “Did Nate die of an overdose?” she asked, hoping it was some other Nate that Ed had known.

April’s eyes grew large, “Oh no, he was murdered.  Out at the Fort.  Somebody tied him to the bridge and slit his throat. I told my husband nobody was fixin’ to murder him, but like I said he was pretty freaked.”

“I would imagine it would be a shock to anyone’s system to lose a friend like that,” said Emma.  “You said your husband had known him since high school?”

“That’s what he said, though I never met the guy so I don’t think they were still friends.  Ed said Nate had probably been going on about the treasure and somebody didn’t know he was full of shit and killed him over it.”

“Treasure?” asked Emma.

“I don’t know much about that,” said April.  “Ed told me how in school Nate was always claiming there was some kind of treasure buried out at his grandparents’ place.  He said nobody ever took him seriously.  Everybody knew his folks didn’t have any money.”

Emma refrained from asking any more questions since she couldn’t think of a therapeutic reason why she needed to know.  Her phone beeped quietly, Kristy’s signal that the hour was nearly over. 

“Let’s meet again next week,” she suggested.  “Now that I know where you’ve been, we can start looking at where you want to go with your life.”

April smiled.  “That would be great,” she said.  She stood and Emma walked her out of the office and left her with Kristy to set up the appointment.

Returning to her office, Emma plunked down in her chair dejectedly.  Here was a piece of information that might help find Nate’s killer and there wasn’t anyone she could tell – not even Jake.  She’d asked April if she or her husband had told the police about the treasure story but April had been adamant that neither wanted any involvement with a murder or with the police.

There are only three situations in which a therapist can violate a client’s confidentiality.  If April were going to hurt someone, if she were going to hurt herself or if someone else was going to be hurt.  In all three cases, the danger had to be clear and immediate to waive confidentiality.

Since none of those conditions applied in this case, Emma would just have to keep the knowledge of the treasure to herself and hope Jake stumbled across it some other way. 

She sat stewing over the story.  April’s husband thought someone might have believed the tale and killed Nate over it, but was that reasonable?  She put herself in the place of the unknown killer. 

If I heard him talking about a treasure, I wouldn’t kill him.  I’d make him take me to it.  She thought awhile longer.  Or I’d make him tell me where it was and then maybe I’d kill him. 

That might fit with the scenario on the bridge, but I think it would be crazy to kill him before I had my hands on the treasure.  Once I had my hands on the treasure, why would I take him back into town to the bridge?   No, that didn’t make any sense. 

Emma sighed.  She supposed it didn’t make any difference that the police wouldn’t hear the story since it didn’t seem to have any bearing on the killing.  She started typing her case notes into the computer.

Suddenly, she stopped typing.  What was it Nick had told his probation officer?  His father had wanted to take him out to the ranch.  He’d said they had to do it right away, before the ranch was sold out of the family.

What if Nate had wanted his son to help him find the treasure?  Emma had just started to muse on this idea when she heard a discreet knock on her office door.  She looked up just as Kristy opened the door.

“Is my next appointment here so early?” asked Emma, glancing at the clock on her computer.

“No.”  Kristy closed the door and sat across the desk from Emma.  “There’s a young man here.  He’s really upset but he won’t tell me anything other than that he needs to talk to you.”

“Did he give you his name?” asked Emma.

“No.  He’s making me a little nervous.  Do you want me to keep the door open, just in case you need something?”  It was unusual for a client to become violent or abusive but Emma was a realist and knew there was a certain vulnerability to meeting with clients in a closed office.

“Keep it cracked a bit,” she agreed.  “Since he’s not a client, I think we can bend confidentiality just a bit in the name of safety.”

Kristy agreed and disappeared into the reception area.  She returned with a young man, in his late teens or early twenties, who did look decidedly distraught.  Emma could understand why Kristy had been concerned.  As she offered him a seat, she noticed the door close but not quite click shut and knew Kristy would be listening until it seemed there was no cause for concern.

“Kristy said you needed to see me?” she asked the young man.  “Can I ask your name?”

The young man ran a hand through his hair, unusually short for his age.  “Nick Carver,” he said.  Emma fought not to let her surprise show.  “I tried to talk to Mrs. G.” Emma knew this is what youth called Alison Gueistweisal, the probation officer.  “She wasn’t there so I went to Mr. Rand’s office but they said he was in court.”

The teen looked up, his eyes full of desperation.  “I didn’t know where else to turn so I came here.”

Emma got up and walked to the office door.  Opening it, she signaled to Kristy that she was safe and asked her to reschedule her next client.  “Please let them know I will not be able to attend the team meeting today, too.”  Kristy nodded and picked up the phone.

Closing the door, Emma took the visitor chair next to Nick’s.  “Tell me what’s upset you,” she said.  “I want to help.”

Nick closed his eyes and Emma could almost feel the wave of relief that flowed from him.  He took a deep breath and started talking.  “I need help,” he said.  He started shaking and Emma put her hand on his arm, encouraging him to go on.

“Somebody’s trying to kill me,” he said.  “They killed my dad and they tried to kill me.  I ran away.  I thought I’d lost them but they must have found me.”

“Nick, just breathe,” said Emma soothingly.  “You’re safe here.  I know that your father was killed.”

Nick nodded.  “I know, I saw Mr. Rand at the Fort.”

“You were at the Fort that night?” asked Emma.

“I was following my dad.  He was acting all mysterious, said he had someone he had to meet but he said I couldn’t go with him so I followed him.”

“Let’s back up just for a moment,” said Emma.  “The last I heard, you were at college in Sheridan.  Why don’t we start there?”

Nick stopped shaking and his voice grew stronger as he talked.  “I came back from class and my dad was sitting in my dorm room.  My roommate let him in.  Dad told me we had to go to my grandparents’ ranch before the lawyer sold it.”

“Why did he want to go to the ranch?” asked Emma, thinking about the treasure.

Nick rolled his eyes.  “My grandfather used to tell my dad that his father, my dad’s grandfather, had buried a treasure somewhere on the ranch.”

“Where would your great grandfather have gotten a treasure and why would he have buried it on the ranch?” asked Emma.

“There wasn’t any treasure,” said Nick with disgust.  “My grandfather told me once he just made up that story.”

“Why would he do that?”

“He said he started out telling the story hoping it would give my father a reason to stay home.  You know, run the ranch and keep it in the family.  That was real important to my grandfather.”

“And he thought it took the promise of buried treasure to interest your dad?”

Nick nodded.  “He told my dad that his grandpa hadn’t trusted banks after the Depression so he took all his money, converted it to silver and buried it.  He told my dad that grandpa had died before telling him where the treasure was and that he, my grandfather, had spent his life searching for it.”

Emma shook her head sadly.  “Obviously your father must have believed the story.”

“He did.  I told him it wasn’t true.  I told him what Grandfather told me about it.”

“He didn’t believe you?”

“No.  He said my grandfather was always saying that just to throw him off, but the treasure was real.  He just needed time to find it.  He’d tried hunting for it after Grandfather died but my grandmother caught him digging up the place and told him he was a damned fool.”

“So now that your grandmother was dead and the place was to be sold, he wanted you to help him make one last search,” finished Emma. 

Nick nodded in agreement.  “Only you didn’t go, is what I heard.  Then you dropped out of school and disappeared.”

Nick looked sheepish.  “I told him he was full of it and he left.  Then I got to thinking about it and I decided what if he was right?  What if there really was a treasure?”

“So you left school to go find your father at the ranch?” asked Emma.

“Yes.”  Nick’s eyes became distant and he smiled.  “Crazy old fool was digging up the floor in the hen house when I got there.  I told him, Dad why don’t we just get a metal detector?  You’d have thought someone would have thought of that before me but I guess not because he looked at me like I was offering him the Holy Grail.”