Mystery Dance: Three Novels (55 page)

“Mm-hmm.” Julia was so relaxed she wasn’t even aware of her pulse rate. She remembered something had been bothering her, but somehow only the lightness seemed important at the moment.

“I’ll see you on Tuesday. Have a good evening, Julia.”

“Bye, Dr. Forrest,” she said softly. “And thanks.”

She hung up the phone and was very nearly asleep when she remembered the ring.

She rolled out of bed, clinging to the peaceful images that Dr. Forrest had suggested. She took the old stained cloth from the desk and picked up the ring without making skin contact with the metal. She sealed it inside the box and tucked the box back in her purse for safekeeping.

Outside, darkness was falling, and pricks of light appeared in the buildings as the city changed shifts. Julia undressed, slipped into a thin nightgown, and climbed into bed. She fell asleep wondering if Mitchell would call.

She awoke refreshed, unburdened by the lingering images of any dreams. She scarcely thought of the ring in her purse. After a shower, she dressed and went down to the lobby for a cup of coffee. Caffeine was bad for her, made it harder for her to remain calm, but the habit was old. Maybe someday, after Dr. Forrest healed her, she’d be able to give up all her little crutches.

When Julia got back to her room, she dialed the offices of
The Commercial Appeal
and reached her old friend Sue.

“Well, looky what the cat dragged in,” Sue said in her slow drawl. The sounds of a busy newsroom spilled from the background.

“Did you get my message?” Julia asked.

“Just got it this morning. I figured you’d call me here, and I didn’t want to call back in case Mitchell was with you.”

“There was nothing to interrupt, unfortunately.”

“That’s a shame, girl. Damn, that man is a hunk.” Sue McAllister had never been shy about poking into other people’s bedrooms or closets. That was why she was such a successful reporter. “Well, if you’re not in Memphis to rumple the sheets with Mitchell Austin, what the heck are you doing here?”

“Just doing a little digging,” Julia said. “And I was hoping you could help.”

“Honey, we’ve been through all the files in the morgue. You’ve got every scrap of information on your father’s case that was ever printed. Hell, you know more about the case than the cops do.”

You can say that again
, Julia thought, and almost told Sue about finding the ring. But it was her one little secret, the one thing that provided a solid link to that long-ago night. Julia knew she was being paranoid, but she decided that the secret was worth keeping for now. “I’d like to get a list of the detectives who worked on the disappearance.”

“I thought you already did that.”

“Well, I wasn’t paying attention to the names.”

“Hey, I can tell you’re onto something. You going to let old Susie Q in on the deal?” Sue used Julia’s nickname for her, a reference to the Credence Clearwater Revival song.

“You’ll get the scoop if something turns up. I know solving a twenty-year-old missing-persons case isn’t Page One stuff, but at least you’ll have my gratitude.”

“Great. That and a quarter will let me throw a coin in a street musician’s hat.”

“Is it okay if I come down around eleven? Then I’ll take you out to lunch.”

“Okay. I’ll have to run, though. They’re releasing the autopsy report of a suspected drug dealer. Five bullet holes in him, what do you think was the cause of death?”

“Let me guess. No matter what the medical examiner’s ruling, the D.A.’s office will go, ‘No evidence, no case.’“

“Saves taxpayer money.”

Julia took a cab across town. The
Appeal
had changed very little in four months, and Julia grew a little wistful seeing her old desk. The newsroom was just as busy as before, her column inches in the first four pages filled by younger, hungrier writers. A few former coworkers seemed glad to see her, but afforded her only a couple of minutes before turning back to the day’s breaking stories.

Sue McCallister was vibrant in a red skirt and jacket, her curly brown hair tied back with a scarf. Julia hugged her, glad for some human contact after enduring Mitchell’s mood swings. They spent a couple of minutes catching up on the last few months and Julia’s new job, and then Sue said, “You got your ‘bloodhound’ face on. Let’s get to the clippings.”

They went to a small cubicle and sat at a table covered with press releases and Styrofoam coffee cups. Sue had already made copies of all the stories on Douglas Stone’s disappearance, and the pages protruded from a manila folder. Julia was familiar with most; she had clippings of the case tucked into her filing cabinet in Elkwood. This time, though, she jotted notes from each.

“Ah, what are we looking for?” Sue said, her smile bright with lipstick.

“Cops. I’m tracking the trackers.”

“Well, T.L. Snead headed that case, at least early on. It got dropped pretty quick.”

“Snead. Why does that sound familiar?”

“Probably because you’ve read it a hundred times. He’s the one who made all the media statements.”

They went deeper into the pile. Other officers listed were Whitmore, a Sgt. J.T. Redding, and Sgt. W.R. Ussery. Julia scanned the copy she almost knew by heart, hoping to catch something she had missed the first time. No mention of Satanic connections had ever been made.

One article was accompanied by a photograph of little Julia, her eyes wide and her mouth relaxed in shock. Some unidentified Social Services worker was leading her into an office building. The cut-line copy downplayed the “abandoned girl” theme, but it was impossible to avoid sensationalism totally. Julia had been front-page news for nearly a week, slipped to the crime briefs, and finally was gone, fading into the gray wasteland of dead stories.

Snead was quoted in several of the early articles. He used copspeak such as “We’re following up on every lead” and “We’re hopeful that Mr. Stone will be found.” Snead was photographed at the front of the house, directing the investigation, his hooked nose and dark eyes making him look like a great bird of prey. Far in the background, barely visible in the murky ink of the fence line, the barn stood in the meadow.

Julia’s heart raced for a moment, but she turned her mind back to business.

“T.L. Snead, T.L. Snead,” Julia murmured. “I wonder what his initials stand for?”

Sue wiggled two of her fingers. “Let your fingers do the walking, girl.”

Sue turned to her computer and mouse-clicked her way to a database of public records that included municipal police reports. A separate database listed the members of the police force, their salaries, and career highlights. Sue made a dirty joke about “police briefs” as she browsed the files.

T.L. Snead was not on the current roster. A search revealed that Snead had transferred from the force four months ago, though he was nearing retirement. The lieutenant had resigned to accept a position in Elkwood, North Carolina.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

“Weird,” said Sue. “How many people move from Memphis to Elkwood every year?”

“Do you believe in coincidences?” Julia asked.

“I don’t believe anything unless I read it in the paper. You know the first rule of journalism: Consider the source.”

Julia’s mind raced with this new information. T.L. Snead had led the investigation into her father’s disappearance, an investigation that seemed to have been haphazard at best. Was Snead the one who had searched her father’s closet and failed to see the loose boards? Or had he deliberately ignored what he saw?

Or maybe–and this was the leap Julia kept to herself, lest Sue believe she was paranoid and delusional–Snead had planted the ring.

And the barn. The barn was part of the area that should have been searched. If Julia had been violated and abused there, some evidence might have remained, spots of blood or footprints or crushed grass marking a trail across the meadow. The police should have canvassed the entire neighborhood. Could Snead have taken responsibility for searching the barn, knowing that any stray evidence would stay secret if he filed a negative report?

No, this is stupid. Rick O’Dell is wrong. The police are not owned by Satan. They haven’t sold their souls and aren’t covertly working for capital-E ‘Evil’ under the guise of law and order.

If people were able to sell their souls, and Satan truly was the Master of the World, a cop would probably ask for a job that was better-paid and less dangerous. But if a man were deluded enough to believe that Satan existed, maybe such a willing slave would let the “master” determine the task. Religious fanatics throughout history had done stranger things, such as flog themselves with whips, wear sackcloth and rub themselves with ashes, and perform suicide attacks on so-called infidels.

Then again, if Satan wanted to work dark miracles in the world, why not first corrupt law and order?

“What are you thinking about?” Sue asked, leaning away from the computer.

“How many unsolved murders have you covered since you’ve been working here?”

“Hmm. In twelve years, maybe eight or ten. Murder is one of the easiest crimes to solve. The idiots almost always have an obvious motive, whether they realize it or not. It’s a matter of putting the pieces together.”

“And the eight or ten?”

“Give me a minute.” Sue left the cubicle and waded through the journalistic storm of the newsroom. While she was gone, a man with graying hair and glasses scowled at Julia sitting at the computer. She looked away and he left.

Sue returned in a few minutes with another manila folder. “Even with computers, sometimes you can’t beat good old black and white.”

“I’ve seen your filing system. How did you ever manage to find that?”

“Job security. If you scramble everything around until you’re the only person who knows where the good stuff is, they can’t afford to fire you. Even in the age of Google and the Internet, sometimes you need a piece of paper.”

“Ah-hah. That might come in handy when you write your true crime book.”

“‘True crime’ nothing. I’m going to make it all up. Same as I do with Page One stories.”

Julia laughed, glad to be around someone she was comfortable with. She was hit with a wave of warm nostalgia. Despite her diffuse and fractured memories, she’d had a routine here, along with friends and a fiancé. But Elkwood was more soothing somehow, as if its rounded, ancient mountains were shoulders to lean on in troubled times. She already missed the smell of the hardwoods and the splendor of the autumn forest. It seemed like weeks had passed since she’d arrived in Memphis.

Sue opened the folder, glanced at the incident reports, and passed them to Julia. Sue’s original notes on the case were attached to the reports with paper clips.

“Caucasian male, aged approximately 30, found on the shore of the Mississippi by some kids,” Julia paraphrased aloud. “Decapitated. Disemboweled. Fingerprint check came up empty.”

“Ooh, that was a good one,” Sue said, affecting a wistful sigh. “I got two weeks of front page out of that one. I followed up on it about six months later. Nothing ever came of it, but I suppose the case officially is still open.”

Julia read through the next case. White female, early twenties, multiple stab wounds to the chest. Wrists slashed. Exsanguinated. The M.E. unable to determine if the blood had been drained before or after the victim’s death. Possible sexual assault. Missing the tip of the right pinkie.

Three other victims were found in various stages of mutilation. In one instance, the M.E. had determined that some sort of symbol had been carved into a ruined section of flesh. None of the investigators speculated on the possibility of ritual murder. A couple were more mundane cases that appeared to be drug-related violence. The cases were spaced one or two years apart, and no connection had ever been made between them.

“Did you ever try to connect the dots?” Julia asked. “These murders have several things in common.”

“Yeah, once I asked old Budgie if I could spend a few weeks running with it. You know what she said?”

Budgie was the less-than-fond nickname for the
Appeal’s
news editor, Bridget Lawrence. She had a reputation for having greater concern for the paper’s budget than for her reporters’ pay rates. Plus, when Lawrence made up her mind, she wouldn’t budge from her opinion, hence the nickname.

Julia drooped her jaws in imitation of Budgie’s sour bulldog face. “What are we going to run in the meantime, press releases?” Julia said in a high-pitched, cigarette-scarred voice. They shared another laugh.

For a wild instant, Julia thought of moving back to Memphis and taking up her old life here where she had left off. She could probably get her job back and work on these clues in her spare time. She could get right back to normal, or the closest thing that passed for normal for someone with panic disorder.

Except such straight roads from the past and future didn’t exist. Everything had changed. Julia was losing touch with Mitchell, but she had found Dr. Forrest. And being healed was more important than anything else right now.

To be healed, she needed to be in Elkwood with her therapist. Sobered, Julia studied the notes again.

“Well, two things jump out at me,” said Julia. “First, all the victims were killed with knives or sharp instruments.”

“Yeah, one M.E. says an ax was used to hack open the chest cavity. Other than that, everything from serrated edges to surgical blades. None of them were shot or bludgeoned first, so we assume the victims were carved up while still alive. So, what’s the other connection?”

“You’re slipping a little, Susie Q. You’ll never get your Pulitzer at this rate.”

“Sacrilege. What do you see?”

“The chief investigating officer. The same for each case.”

Sue snatched the papers away and shuffled through them. “I’ll be doggoned. Our old friend Lt. Snead.”

“I guess he moved up to Homicide. He headed all these cases and then happened to move to Elkwood right after I did. What are the odds when you cross several one-in-a-million coincidences?”

“I never was good at math. That’s why I went into journalism.”