LET ME FORGET, page 11
Maybe the abductions were tied in with the chop shop ring after all. Sheriff Hyland must know that Warwick had once worked for the Osbornes. Maybe that’s the reason he’d linked Jerry’s disappearance with Cole’s.
“When was the last time that you saw Lester Warwick?”
Marilyn clenched her bottom lip between her teeth. “About two years ago. Right after we bought our cow, Mable. That’s when Lester got the job at the poultry plant.”
The timeframe didn’t fit the way Ashley had expected. Maybe Jerry had seen Warwick recently.
“How was the relationship between Lester and Jerry? Did they socialize together or have any friends in common?”
“Naw, nothing like that. They ain’t friends, but they don’t have no ill will between them either.”
Ashley wanted to find out whether the Osbornes knew Deputy Kelton, but she feared her words would be overheard. She leaned toward Marilyn. “Does Jerry have any friends who work at the sheriff’s department?” she asked in a hushed voice.
A shocked expression crossed Marilyn’s face. “I don’t mean no disrespect, so don’t take this wrong. But we don’t hang out with cops.”
The woman’s disdain for the police came as no surprise. But Ashley suspected that Deputy Kelton might be working on the wrong side of the law. And it was possible that Jerry had acquaintances and associates that Marilyn didn’t know about.
Was there a reason that Jerry might need to leave town? Had he run for his life? Did he possess the same information as Warwick?
The next question Ashley needed to ask would be the most difficult. “Can you think of any reason that Jerry might want to stage his own disappearance?”
Marilyn pressed her lips into a thin line. “And that’s the reason we don’t like cops. Y’all always think the worst of everybody.” She bolted up from the sofa. “Y’all need to be out looking for Jerry. Not asking me a bunch of stupid questions.”
“I didn’t mean to offend you, Mrs. Osborne,” Ashley stated, rising from her seat. “But we have to explore all of the possibilities in order to find your husband.”
Although the woman seemed distraught—possessed an air of innocence—Marilyn obviously realized that she was a suspect in Jerry’s disappearance as well. At least for the time being.
A look of fury replaced the tears in Marilyn’s eyes. “I’m gonna go upstairs now,” she said. “Y’all know the way out.”
Ashley watched as the woman stomped toward the foyer. Was her anger really due to a belief that her husband would never fake his own death? Or was Marilyn hiding something? Had she realized that there was a possibility that Jerry had run out on her?
Right after Marilyn marched out of the living room, Sheriff Hyland appeared at the doorway.
“Something go wrong?” he asked.
Wyatt and Ashley exchanged glances.
“Just the usual,” Wyatt said. “Mrs. Osborne didn’t like one of our questions.”
Hyland nodded, an expression of understanding crossing his face. “Did you get in touch with forensics?”
“Our team’s driving over from Briarwood,” Wyatt stated. “They’ll be here in a few hours.”
When the TBI forensic techs arrived, they would dust for prints and scour the place for evidence. But Ashley wanted to conduct a search of her own.
“Have you been all the way through the house?” she asked the sheriff.
“Yeah. The upstairs seems clean. And I didn’t find anything in the barn.”
From where she stood, Ashley had a narrow view into the kitchen. She wondered whether the intruder had busted open the back door or if he’d picked the lock. Maybe Jerry had let the man inside.
Was Jerry’s abductor someone he knew?
Ashley headed through the doorway that led into the kitchen. Just as Marilyn had said, the round, wooden table had been shoved up next to a bank of cabinets, and one of the chairs had been overturned. But she noticed something else the woman hadn’t mentioned. A knife was missing from the block on the counter. Was the knife in the dishwasher? Or had it been used to threaten Jerry?
She moved to the back door and checked the frame and the lock. There were no obvious signs of a forced entry. Once Marilyn calmed down a bit, Ashley would ask whether an extra key was hidden somewhere on the property. Since Warwick had worked on the farm, he might know how to get inside the house. And he could have divulged the information to a member of the chop shop gang.
Wyatt wandered past Ashley toward an adjacent hallway. She followed. Just as she crossed the threshold, Wyatt stopped short in front of her. Their bodies almost collided.
“At least we’ve got the answer to one question,” he stated, motioning toward the floor to his left.
The blade of a butcher knife glinted beneath the overhead light. The black handle matched the set in the wooden block. Wyatt snapped several photos with his cell phone. Then he pulled on a pair of latex gloves and picked up the knife with his fingertips.
“I don’t see any blood,” he said.
Since the weapon had been left on the floor in plain sight, it was doubtful that it had been wiped down. Maybe Jerry had grabbed the knife for protection, and the intruder had knocked it out of his hand. Rather than bagging the weapon, Wyatt placed it back on the floor for the forensic techs to examine.
Ashley trailed Wyatt into the utility room. The breaker box hung on the wall next to the hot water heater. If the abductor had switched off the power, how did he see to attack Jerry? Did he have night vision goggles? They’d become quite popular with hunters in the mountains.
Across from the utility room was a small dining room. Ashley circled around the long oak table and emerged back into the foyer. She’d completed the tour of the downstairs. From what she’d seen, she guessed Jerry had been subdued after a fight near the staircase. He’d probably been knocked unconscious.
She edged around the shards of glass from the destroyed vase. Kneeling down, she took one last look at the flowers strewn across the floor. Ashley’s breath caught in her throat as she realized what the silk blooms had masked. The tiny pink and yellow dots on the hardwood hadn’t come from the floral arrangement. They were pieces of Mylar confetti.
Anti-felon identification tags fired from a police Taser.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Kneeling in the foyer of the Osbornes’ farmhouse, Ashley fished a pair of latex gloves from one of the pockets in her cargo jacket and snapped them on. Shards from a broken crystal vase glimmered around her on the hardwood floor next to an overturned wooden accent table. Hidden among the silk flowers that had once filled the vase, she found a smattering of tiny pink and yellow confetti.
The Mylar anti-felon ID tags had been shot from a police Taser.
Did Deputy Kelton abduct Jerry Osborne?
The tags contained the serial number of the cartridge that had fired them. Would the unique number trace back to the Fergus County Sheriff’s Department?
One thing bothered Ashley. Kelton knew the tags bore a tracking ID. Would he have left them behind? Although difficult to pick up by hand, the twenty to thirty tags the cartridges emitted could be collected with a vacuum cleaner. Maybe Kelton had run out of time.
Had the abductor been in the house, planning to conduct a cleanup, when Marilyn returned?
Ashley placed her index finger on one of the pink tags. The Mylar dot stuck to her glove.
Sensing movement behind her, she turned and looked up. Wyatt had walked into the foyer.
“You’re not going to believe what I just found,” she stated, holding up her hand.
Wyatt squinted at her finger. “Is that—”
“Yes, and it could belong to one of the deputies involved in the chop shop ring. I think we need to have a talk with Sheriff Hyland.”
She peered out through the glass panes in the front door. The sheriff stood in the yard, smoking a cigarette, and talking with the deputy that had met them when they’d first arrived at the farmhouse.
Pulling the door open, Wyatt called out. “Sheriff? Could you come inside for a minute?”
Hyland stubbed out his cigarette with the toe of his boot and headed up the porch steps. She knew his office would have the serial numbers on file for all of the Taser cartridges they’d purchased.
“You find something?” he asked.
Ashley glanced toward the top of the stairs. “Maybe we should move into the living room where we can have a little more privacy.”
She hoped the deputy would remain outside.
The sheriff nodded and followed Ashley and Wyatt into the next room.
She held out her hand so that Hyland had a clear view of the AFID tag. “Does this look familiar?” she asked him.
“Well, I know what it is, if that’s what you’re asking. Where’d it come from?”
She knew he was referring to the location where she’d found the tag. But the most important question was: who had fired the Taser?
“We were hoping that you could give us that information. And that you would tell us everything you know about Deputy Kelton.”
“Kelton?” A puzzled look crossed Hyland’s face.
“He was the person who found Cole’s car,” Ashley reminded the sheriff. “He could have moved the seat up toward the steering wheel to throw us off track. And we know that one or more of your deputies are accomplices in the car theft ring.”
“Now wait,” Hyland said, his voice firm. “You’re barking up the wrong tree. First of all, my department doesn’t have Tasers. Our budget’s too tight. And second, Kelton’s not involved—I’d stake my job on that. I’ve known him his all his life. Him and his folks. They’re good people.”
Although the sheriff held Kelton in high regard, Ashley knew from experience that some people—even those we believed to be the closest to us—were often not as trustworthy as they appeared.
She exchanged a glance with Wyatt.
“Then which of your deputies do you suspect of being mixed up with the chop shop?”
Hyland sighed. “I wish I knew. Warwick hasn’t given up any names. His lawyer’s trying to work out some kind of deal with the DA. We won’t get any info until that’s done.”
It disappointed Ashley to learn that the sheriff had no idea which of the members of his force had switched to the dark side, and to find out that his department didn’t own Tasers. But the TBI would still be able to trace the serial number of the cartridge. The process would just take a little longer.
Placing the ID tag inside an evidence bag, she shoved it into her pocket.
Sheriff Hyland had overlooked the Mylar confetti in the foyer. She wondered whether he’d missed other important clues on the property. Since Marilyn was still upstairs, Ashley decided she’d check out the Osbornes’ barn.
Leaving Wyatt and Hyland conversing in the living room, she padded into the kitchen and slipped out the back door. Her breath clouded in the frosty morning air as she crossed the back yard. It was possible Jerry had continued his business relationship with Warwick long after the man had left his employ. The Osbornes could have used the dairy farm to launder proceeds from the chop shop.
The odor of manure drifted toward her as Ashley pulled open the steel gate that led into the pasture. Careful to look where she stepped, she picked her way up the slope to the gray metal barn. One of the fawn-colored Jersey cows ambled to her side.
“Hi, girl,” Ashley said, patting the cow’s neck.
She slid open the barn door. A large stainless steel milk collection tank rested in the room to her right. The room on the left contained feed bins and shelves stocked with iodine, which she knew was used to prep the cows’ teats before milking, as well as antiseptics and worming medications. There was no desk or filing cabinet in sight. Nothing that would hold financial documents.
Exiting the supply room, she wandered down the concrete aisle that striped the center of the barn. Straw covered the floor of the milking areas that flanked the aisle. Ashley didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
Sighing, she headed back toward the barn’s entrance. She wanted to poke around on the second floor of the Osbornes’ home, but since Marilyn had already stated that she wanted Ashley and Wyatt to leave the premises, it was doubtful the woman would allow it. Maybe the forensic techs would fare better with Marilyn. Hopefully, they’d find something that would help further the investigation.
Ashley eased the barn door open. Her attention shifted toward the farmhouse, and she stopped in her tracks. She almost couldn’t believe what she was witnessing. Ducking down behind the friendly cow so she wouldn’t be spotted, she watched the house in astonishment.
A window on the second floor gaped open. Marilyn, bundled in a red coat, climbed out through the window onto the roof of the back porch. Seeming as though she was well-practiced in using the escape route, the woman inched toward a maple growing next to the house. Grabbing hold of one of the branches, she swung into the tree and then shimmied to the ground.
Obviously unaware that she had an audience, Marilyn ran toward the forest bordering the west side of the farm.
Ashley followed.
CHAPTER TWENTY ONE
Curiosity piqued Ashley’s mind as she raced across the cow pasture at the Osbornes’ farm, keeping Marilyn in her sights. Why had the woman sneaked out of the second-floor window of her own home? Where was Marilyn going? And why did she want her absence kept secret?
Ashley just hoped the woman wouldn’t look back over her shoulder and realize she was being pursued. If that happened, relevant facts surrounding the case might never come out.
Had Ashley hit on the truth when she’d suggested Jerry had staged his own disappearance? Was Marilyn on her way to meet her husband? The man could be lying low in a hunting cabin nestled in the woods. Only one thing didn’t fit. If Jerry’s abduction had been faked, he wouldn’t have needed to fire a Taser.
After seeing the overturned table in the Osbornes’ foyer, Ashley felt certain that someone had been subdued by the Taser’s barbs. Maybe Jerry had been the one who’d fired the weapon. Like Warwick, he could have information that would blow apart the chop shop ring, securing a long prison sentence for the members. Maybe the ringleader had sent a henchman to shut Jerry up permanently. But instead, Jerry had won the fight. And now, fearing for his life, he’d gone into hiding.
Darting through the pasture’s gate, Ashley swerved toward the western edge of the property. Up ahead, Marilyn disappeared into the dense hardwood forest. Ashley feared that the woman might get away. Increasing her speed, she flew across the Osbornes’ back yard. As she neared the tree line, she spotted a path snaking through the underbrush. Marilyn and Jerry had obviously hiked the trail on a regular basis. Where did it lead?
Trying to catch up, Ashley pushed her muscles harder. As she rounded an oak tree, a wave of frustration struck her. She stopped cold. The path forked at her feet. Had Marilyn continued straight ahead? Or had the woman veered to the left? Each branch of the trail appeared equally well-traveled.
Ashley had to make a decision. Fast. Every second she faltered added distance between herself and Marilyn. But what if Ashley made the wrong choice? If the path led her to a dead end, by the time she backtracked, Marilyn and Jerry could be gone. They might flee the state, taking their knowledge of what had happened to Cole with them.
Letting her instincts act as her guide, Ashley plowed straight ahead.
As the soles of her hiking boots pounded against the uneven ground, Ashley’s left shoulder throbbed. Focusing on the forest ahead, she struggled to block out the pain. The medication the emergency room doctor had given her lay tucked in one of the pockets of her cargo jacket, but she fought the urge to swallow the pills. Her thoughts needed to remain sharp and clear. Allowing her mind to become sluggish wasn’t an option.
The path corkscrewed between the trunks of a stand of hickories. Ashley caught sight of a patch of cream through the bare branches. Another farmhouse rested up ahead. She slowed her pace as she neared the clearing.
Ducking behind the wide trunk of a sycamore, she scanned the home’s rear yard. A chicken coop stood halfway between the forest and the cream-sided house. A spot of color drew Ashley’s attention: Marilyn’s red coat. The woman had just trotted up the wooden steps of the farmhouse’s back porch.
A series of loud thumps echoed through the trees as Marilyn banged on the home’s door.
Wanting to get a closer view, Ashley bolted from the woods and zoomed toward the safety of the chicken coop. The hens pecked at the ground inside their sprawling wire cage, ignoring her arrival. She was glad the chickens had stayed quiet. As Ashley peeked around the wooden building’s corner, angry voices drifted toward her.
A dark-haired man, seeming to be in his late thirties, had joined Marilyn on the porch. The two appeared to be about the same height which meant the man was shorter than five-nine.
A realization struck Ashley. It was possible that a woman had driven Cole’s car to Rattler Ridge. She didn’t know why she hadn’t thought of that prospect before now. Instead of one man being responsible for the disappearance, it could be a team. A husband and wife. Or a man and his lover.
Was Marilyn romantically involved with the man on the porch?
Ashley strained her ears, trying to make sense of the couple’s heated conversation.
“… delivery to Alabama!” Marilyn shouted.
Although she’d been unable to decipher the first half of the woman’s sentence, Ashley wondered whether Marilyn was upset about stolen car parts shipped out of state. Warwick had told his attorney that the chop shop ring included members in Alabama and Georgia.
The next words out of the woman’s mouth rang clear. “Prove you ain’t killed Jerry!” Marilyn cried out.
The woman had obviously lied when she’d stated that her husband had no known enemies. Maybe Jerry and the man on the porch were partners in crime. It was possible that they’d only recently butted heads over an Alabama parts delivery. Speculation aside, Marilyn had reason to believe that the man had harmed her husband.
