Best Kept Secrets Page 6

“Could the bones have been broken by the bulldozer moving them?” Morgan asked.

  Lyle shook his head. “These fractures happened before death. Including the ones to the face.”

  “Cause of death?” Morgan knelt and looked closely at the skull. Dragged into the bushes beside Jackson Creek, Fay had been struck in the face with a heavy object. The creek bed was searched for a weapon, but no evidence was found.

  “Look at this.” Lyle pointed to the skull. “There was significant traumatic impact above the teeth. You can see how the blow cracked the surrounding bone. Over time, decay and nature dissolved the tissue and these bones fell apart,” he said. “This wouldn’t have killed her, but likely the blow to her nose did. Her face was destroyed.”

  Indeed, Morgan gaped at the shattered bone between the eyes and above the teeth. Like Hallie and Fay? She looked for the corpse’s hands.

  “A gunshot might do that.” Donnie said.

  “There’s no exit wound.” Lyle knelt down beside Morgan and pointed at the skull. “Also, there’re no buckshot or bullets inside the skull.” Three upper and three lower teeth were missing or broken, creating a circular hole.

  “It was a brutal act then.” Donnie shifted his weight and yawned.

  “This was no accident. The body was buried two feet underground,” Lyle speculated.

  Morgan had an incredible, crazy thought. It had to do with Fay again, so she knew it was part of that old obsession. Her gut churned at the possible connections to this case and to Hallie. She had to know … “Were her hands intact or broken?”

  “The bones aren’t shattered if that’s what you’re asking. However, since the site was plowed up by a bulldozer, it will be impossible to tell if her fingers were broken at the joint before she died. Why do you ask?”

  “Hallie Marks had been struck in the face too,” she said to Donnie.

  Donnie gave her a look that Morgan took to mean he didn’t want her drawing too many conclusions just yet.

  She turned to Lyle. “How old are the remains?”

  Lyle answered, “Fifteen or twenty years.”

  “Are you sure?” She asked.

  “I’m sure.” Lyle told them, “She was attacked from the front. The impact wounds are all on her face. Either she was surprised and attacked head-on, or …”

  Donnie finished the sentence, “someone held her while another person bludgeoned her to death.”

  “Are two killers working together?” Morgan voiced the question in her mind.

  Lyle removed his soiled latex gloves and stepped down from the mound of earth. He was still a good three inches taller than Donnie and towered over Morgan. “Inform the developers that this is a homicide. The investigation will halt their progress. We have to scour this area for a weapon.”

  “What was she hit with?” Donnie asked.

  “Something heavy. Something like …” Keeping his gaze on the skeleton, Lyle bared his teeth and sucked air between them.

  A rock was the first image that popped into Morgan’s mind, and it frightened her. She took a step backward and said, “Like a hammer.”

  “That would work.” Lyle nodded

  Morgan looked out at the woods. The dogs led by the canine patrol were sniffing along the edge of the uncut woods about forty yards away.

  CHAPTER 12

  CARYN

  Adding one to the number of times she had driven to the Oak Creek Condominiums parking lot, Caryn Klein committed the number 2,034 to memory. It had been after dark 1,382 times. Also, she’d parked in this particular parking spot 867 times. She liked to keep track. It made her feel more in control.

  “Caryn! Caryn! You okay?” Brad Olafson, a neighbor knocked on her car window.

  She shut off the engine, popped the trunk, and then climbed out with her purse in tow.

  “You okay, Caryn? Geez. I knocked on the window, like, a hundred times.”

  It wasn’t one hundred. It was forty-two, Caryn thought.

  “You okay?” Brad, the condo association manager and self-proclaimed on-site handy man, lived in the next building. They had met at the pool the first summer she lived here, four years and five months ago—1,582 days.

  “I’m fine.” she answered, as nicely as she could manage, and stepped around to the trunk of the car. While lifting the hatch, her sleeve pulled back, exposing a trickle of blood dripping down the back of her hand.

  Color drained from Brad’s face. “What’s that on your arm? Did you hurt yourself?”

  “It’s nothing, Brad.” Caryn had scraped it on the sharp edge of an open drawer at work. A little blood didn’t bother her, she’d wiped it off with a tissue and thought it was fine. Apparently, the cut was deeper than she thought. She wanted to get inside to examine it in private. Removing a green army-issue shoulder bag from the trunk, she closed the hatch and turned toward her building.

  “Are you sure? I could bandage that up for you.” He followed at her heels, panting like a good little dog. “I hate for you to be all alone. You seem out of it. Want me to stay for a while? To make sure you don’t … you know … pass out or something. Maybe you lost a lot of blood.”

  She reached the outer door to her building and unlocked it, eager to get away from the idiot. With a calm, placating voice at the tip of her tongue, she said, “Thanks for checking on me, Brad,” but concluded with a heavy dose of patronizing, “You can go off and find someone else to bother now.” He never got the hint no matter how cruel she was. If they had dated, she would have dumped him hard. But Caryn had said no the first, fifth, and twentieth time he had asked her out. He was still trying.

  “Hey, I’ve got brewskis in my fridge. I’ll bring them to your place. We can—”

  “No, Brad. Mack is coming by.”

  “Is he your boyfriend? Is Mack your boyfriend?”

  Without answering, Caryn ducked into the foyer and let the outer door swing closed on Brad. Climbing the stairs to the third floor, she counted: five on the first flight, twelve after that, and then ten and ten. Thirty-seven total. She knew the exact number of steps up to her floor because, every time, she counted. Every time, the total was the same. There was security in that.

  Her landline was ringing as she opened her door. Thinking it was the single-minded and persistent Brad, she answered, “Brad, I said—”

  “There you are. Hey.” It wasn’t Brad. “I tried your cell. You didn’t answer.”

  “I shut it off.” With the cordless pressed to the side of her face, Caryn walked into the dark living room and flipped on a light. “Hi, Mack.” Gilroy Mackintosh and Caryn had been seeing each other for over twenty months. Twenty months, two weeks, and five days. Or 622 days.

  “Brad bothering you again?” The voice on the other end of the line soothed her nerves like cool running water over a burn.

  “You guessed it.” She placed the green satchel on the floor and sat down on the new couch, barely sinking into the soft cushions. “What time is it?”

  “Six thirty. You just get in?”

  “Just.”

  “How was your day? Did you enjoy tormenting and torturing the employees of Garrison Electric? I suppose you sufficiently whipped them into submission?”

  Caryn loved her job. She was an associate CPA for the Indiana Office of Accounting. She got to spend her day with numbers, not people. Numbers never lied. And they never left you. “Yes. They cower in fear, the little lackeys.” A thin smile graced her lips.

  “I’ll let you whip me if you want,” he invited cheerfully.

  Caryn hoped he meant it. “Are you coming over?”

  “Am I?” Mack was easy.

  “Can you get away from her?” she asked.

  “I’ll make it happen.”

  With the phone in one hand, she peeled a multicolored infinity scarf off over her head. The scarf matched everything she owned. It had little flecks of blue, green, red, and yellow. And orange, the color of the itchy wool sweater she was wearing. Mack had bought them both for her. “Can you bring di
nner? I didn’t have time …”

  “To go to the grocery,” he finished her sentence. “Of course I can. Do you want carryout from Chang’s?”

  Her stomach growled. “I don’t care. Sure.”

  Seriously, Mack queried, “What would you eat if I didn’t keep bringing you food?”

  “Nothing. Pop Tarts. I would probably starve.” She smiled to herself. “See you soon.”

  Mack hung up. He wasn’t one for goodbyes on the phone. Leaning back on her comfortable, colorless couch, Caryn brushed the fibers in one direction, erasing any marks. It was new, like most of her furniture, and had a soft-as-suede finish. As a result of Mack’s pitiless nudging she’d finally sprung for upgrades to her living arrangements.

  Before Mack, she had slept on a futon on the floor. Her dresser was one she’d found on the street during her college years. Her neighbor gave her three wooden barstools for the kitchen when she moved away to New York. And she had owned a ratty, flower-print chair that she bought at Goodwill while shopping for clothes one day.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t have the money. Her job at Indiana Office of Accounting paid well. And being single, she accrued very few expenses. Comfort wasn’t in her vocabulary before Mack. Truthfully, Caryn didn’t care how her apartment looked. Mack did though. And he was on his way over.

  She pulled back her sleeve. The two-inch gash was just below her elbow on the top side of her arm. It was deep. On the way to the bathroom, she took off her orange sweater. Blood had soaked the inside of the sleeve, so she threw the sweater on the floor, planning to soak it in Woolite later. Without waiting for the water to warm up, she plunged her arm under the faucet, splashing fresh, red blood on the countertop.

  CHAPTER 13

  CARYN: 6 Months Ago

  Cold blew right through her jacket. Caryn had forgotten to wear the infinity scarf Mack had given her. The glass outer door of the accounting office where she’d worked for five years was heavy against the wind. Debris flew in with her.

  “Good morning, Caryn,” the receptionist greeted her.

  Caryn allowed her lips to curl upward. “Morning,” she said as she slithered to her cubicle. She had no time to set her briefcase down before her boss, Harry Randall Monroe, sped to her desk.

  “Morning, Caryn. Through with those reports?” He rubbed a hand across his shiny bald head. Each of the women at IOA had stories about their boss. Behind his back they called him Harry the Hairless Dick. He never hit on them, but he had a way of implying something sexual.

  “Yes, Mr. Monroe, they’re done.” Caryn said, and she turned on her computer.

  “Good. The IRS is hammering on me for those. The hearing is next Monday.” He stood a little too close for Caryn’s comfort.

  With her shoulder, she nudged him out of the way. “Give me a chance to get the files up. I just walked in,” she said, wanting him to leave her alone.

  “Sure thing.” Harry leaned his hip against her desk. His large hands gripped the edge.

  Caryn tried to ignore him hovering over her like a big hot-air balloon. She shifted a few folders from her briefcase to a drawer while waiting for the computer to boot up.

  “Nice weather we’re having. I love these cool fall days. I’m driving down to Brown County this weekend. It sure is beautiful down there. Don’t you love being outdoors this time of year?” he said.

  Don’t, she thought. Please don’t talk about hiking. Harry would talk a stream about his nature walks and fix-it projects. If she let him go on, he’d invite her again.

  He didn’t wait for her response. “Can’t wait for hunting season to open. Do you hunt, Caryn? For some reason you strike me as a hunter.”

  Caryn interrupted him. “I’ll have these reports for you in just a minute, Mr. Monroe.” Subtlety was a new skill for her, sought on Mack’s advice and not yet well developed. Caryn was never sure how far to let things go before telling someone off. Mack had explained the nuances of it and why she shouldn’t be rude to people, like her boss.

  Please don’t talk about hiking …

  “Anyway, I found a great hiking trail in the National Park. The trails lead up to this old lodge, the Abe Martin Lodge …”

  “Listen.” She turned to face him. “I’ll bring the report to you as soon as it’s up. Just give me some space. Please,” she added.

  He moved away from her desk. “Just remember, those IRS guys don’t care about lipstick and high heels. They wanted the report yesterday.”

  Caryn watched him saunter back to his office like a fat woodchuck going back to its hole in the ground. She refused to play his flirty game or spend time alone with him. She had to be a hard-ass.

  The Garrison Electric file blinked open on her computer, and she did one last check-over. Scrolling through the report, she neared the end where Garrison Electric’s accounting firm signed off. Double-checking her work to cover all her bases, and to delay talking to Harry, Caryn went to the company website. There, a photo of a familiar face slowed her down and turned her blood cold.

  Listed among the chief financial officers seven years ago was a CPA named Nathaniel Johnson. The name, his name, was absolutely wrong. She dragged a box containing Garrison Electric accounting paperwork from six years ago out from under her desk. Several payroll sheets were signed by this person, Nathaniel Johnson. He is not Nathaniel Johnson. This man was someone from her past. She knew him. A chill crept up her spine and out to her fingertips.

  Back on her computer, she scrolled through the next two years of data. He was not listed among their employees in the following year or any subsequent years. She found, looking back, that Garrison Electric had hired him in 2010, and he had only worked there for four years.

  Caryn zoomed in on the photo. There was no mistake. She knew that face better than anyone else’s. This was Ekhard Marcus Klein, her brother.

  With the printed file in her arms, Caryn walked to Harry’s office. Her stomach churned. In front of his desk, she placed the stack in his hands, unable to hear a word he said. Out the window, treetops waved under a light-blue sky and sunshine. A square of sunlight spotted the floor, brightening the gray carpet in the shape of a grave dug especially for Caryn.

  “Caryn? What do you think? Will the IRS go for it?” Harry asked.

  She hadn’t heard the question; her ears were ringing. “I don’t feel good,” she said.

  Harry came to her side. “You look kind of pale, Caryn. Why don’t you sit down for a minute?”

  “Eks.” Caryn’s stomach lurched. “I need to go home, Eks.”

  “What’s that?” Harry put his hands on her shoulders and led Caryn to a black leather sofa where she dropped to her knees and started to heave. Her stomach rejected its contents, splattering remains of Pop Tarts and coffee across the floor and the side of the couch.

  Harry backed away from his employee, calling urgently, “Riannda, come quickly! Oh no. Oh no. Please, Riannda. Get in here, now!”

  CHAPTER 14

  MORGAN

  Piles of dirty laundry, bright-colored clothes, whites, and towels covered the floor at the bottom of the stairs. In the mudroom past the kitchen, the washing machine churned with the first load. Morgan sat cross-legged on the couch with a pillow in her lap. On the couch beside her, a manila file folder contained all the missing persons’ reports in Marion County from the years 1995 through 2005. Printouts were spread out on the coffee table and floor in front of her.

  Adrienne and Bill Rafferty were in Florida until the first of May. And even though Morgan could hang out in her pj’s all day without evoking Adrienne’s parental, pitiful gaze, she missed her. Adrienne would have cooked up casseroles and roasts and other mouth-watering delights. Morgan’s stomach growled.

  With a couch pillow clutched to her breast, she searched the documents for a missing high school girl from Indianapolis. If twenty-five years had passed, that case was cold. Moving chronologically from past toward present years, she’d begun with the folder dated 1999. It had been Lyle’s h
unch that the girl was killed fifteen years ago, around 2004. But after reviewing cases from that year, she realized his intuition had been off.

  Intuition, she thought, do I trust it? My intuition has been off before. Only once …

  Morgan bent forward over the pillow in her lap. From the coffee table in front of her, she picked up the 1999 files. Sixteen girls went missing during that year. Nine girls ran away, two were taken by family members. Murder and kidnapping accounted for a small fraction, but those cases were solved or closed. She placed the folder back on the table and tossed the pillow aside.

  It had been a week since they recovered the body near Fishers. She’d eagerly waited for the forensic department to find a DNA match. She hated waiting. It reminded her of those terrible days after Fay went missing.

  She raised her arms overhead and stretched. When she uncurled her legs and stood up, her stomach rumbled. Cereal seemed an easy option for dinner. If she had made time to go to the grocery, she wouldn’t be eating cereal for dinner. She hadn’t been to the grocery store in weeks.

  Donnie phoned as Morgan was pushing soggy Life cereal squares around the bowl.

  “Lieutenant Holbrooke just called, Mo. They found a hammer up near Fishers.”

  His news lit another beacon inside her. “You’re kidding!”

  “They’re sending it over to forensics to have it examined. I can meet you at the station.”

  “Ah …” She didn’t want to drive the Mazda. “Can you pick me up?”

  “Not like it’s the first time.”

  Morgan ran up the stairs to dress. A pair of jeans from a pile on the floor didn’t look too dirty to wear. She slid into them and threw a soft cable-knit sweater over her head. She teased her fingers through her hair and pulled it into a ponytail. It could be another late night. She hoped it would be a late night. Because Hallie Marks had been killed with a hammer too, she hoped this was the clue she’d been waiting for.

  Statistics were staggering: according to an FBI crime table, hammers and other blunt force instruments—even fists—had killed nearly five hundred people in the last year. It wasn’t uncommon. Morgan knew it. What was uncommon was the way the hands of her victims had been broken before they were murdered. Perhaps with this tool, she could isolate fingerprints, or even a serial number. The excitement made her heart beat a little faster.