Backcountry Read online

  Fine, she thought, be like that. She was satisfied to leave the matter there for now. She was completely drained—mentally, emotionally, and physically.

  Maya led the way to the parking lot. “Blake’s making enchiladas and guacamole and a huge salad with fresh everything. Cherry crisp for dessert.”

  That news gave Sam a jolt of new energy. “You talked to Blake?”

  “Why wouldn’t I?” Maya asked across the top of Sam’s old Civic.

  As she pulled the driver’s door open, Sam grinned. Her remora was back, glomming onto her life, hitching a ride without waiting for an invitation.

  Chapter 23

  After a shower and dinner, Sam longed to go to bed, but she made herself go to her office and write down every detail she could remember about Aidan’s behavior and her encounter with Heigler. She called Detective Greene’s number and left a voice mail message to tell her she had documented all that information. The woman apparently never answered her phone, but she did listen to voice mail and showed up at Sam’s house the next morning to hear her story.

  From her seat at the dining room table, Greene told Sam, “Callahan led the rangers to where he claimed to have left the stash, but the drugs were not there.”

  “Erik Heigler took them,” Sam told her. “Or Aidan Callahan hid them somewhere else.”

  “We’re checking out all the probable scenarios,” Greene assured her. “So far, we have no evidence to link Callahan to Heigler or the drug drop.” She tapped the two pages of description that Sam had printed out for her. “And we have only your word that Heigler was there.”

  Sam gritted her teeth in frustration.

  Greene picked up the coffee cup Sam had given her, saw that it was empty, set it down again. “We ran out of daylight yesterday, but two rangers are headed back this morning to search the area thoroughly.”

  “Good. Will you let me know what they find?”

  The detective sat back in her chair. “If and when it’s appropriate, I will.”

  She’d have to settle for that. Or get Chase to check the case file for her.

  “I can tell you that Facebook delivered the records from Kyla Quintana-Johnson’s account, and from Klapton’s as well.” Greene pulled out her phone and spent a couple of minutes tapping around on the screen. “There were only three messages back and forth between them. The first, from Klapton to Kyla, was ‘Hi, Cuz.’ That was sent three days before the murders. The next day, Kyla responded, ‘Where are you?’”

  So Kyla had been in communication with Erik Heigler. But it didn’t mean she wanted to see him. Where are you? could indicate she was worried about her cousin coming after her family.

  “Then, on that same day, Klapton messaged her back, ‘Working in your area soon, can I see you? 555-459-2772.’” Detective Greene looked up from her phone. “Unfortunately, that’s a prepaid cell, traceable only to the store that sold it for cash.”

  That was the last Facebook message between them. There the trail ended.

  “There were no phone calls to that number from Kyla’s phone. But it doesn’t necessarily mean their communication ended,” Detective Greene told her. “They might have verbally exchanged numbers on different phones.”

  “Can’t you get recordings of all calls to that 555 number?”

  The detective chuckled. “You’ve been watching too much TV. If some shady entity is wiretapping every phone call across America, they haven’t bothered to let law enforcement in on it.”

  “Maya told me that Aidan borrowed Kyla’s phone frequently because he was always forgetting to charge his own. She said he borrowed it on the day they all came back from Kyla’s last expedition.”

  Greene nodded. “Two days before the murders, on the day Kyla and Aidan returned from her last field expedition, there was a call from Kyla’s phone to the Callahan house. Aidan’s mother verified that her son called home on that day. Seems pretty innocent to me.”

  “But Aidan could also have opened Kyla’s Facebook messages and copied down the Klapton number on that day,” Sam argued.

  “Maybe,” Greene acknowledged. “But we have no evidence to prove that.”

  Sam told the detective about her suspicions surrounding Aidan and Pinnacle Lake—the Timberland boot prints, the woven grass heart at the trailhead memorial. “I don’t want to think that Aidan could kill anyone, but—”

  Greene cut her off. “Callahan already told me he visited the memorial. Plus, he has an alibi on the day in question. His mother verifies that he was helping her fix the fence in their back yard on that day.”

  “This is the same mother who resents Kim and Troy for not hiring Aidan as a field guide?”

  Detective Greene studied her face, waiting for more. The woman’s direct gaze was unnerving.

  “I talked to Judy Callahan a couple of weeks ago, on my break,” Sam told her. “Remember, I said she was bitter about her son not getting the supervisory job this year. I put that all in there.” She gestured to the statement she’d written.

  “Interesting.” Greene rose from her chair and gathered the pages from the table top. “Thank you for these. I may have more questions later. I’d appreciate it if you did not speak again to anyone in the Callahan family. I’m sure you need to spend your time searching for work.”

  Sam felt like she should have a witty response stored up for this situation, but she was at a loss for words.

  * * * * *

  Two days later, a new twist developed.

  “The rangers didn’t find any drugs, but they found a corpse in the lake,” Troy informed Sam from his seat on her couch. He’d stopped by her house to deliver her paycheck. “It was Erik. He’d been stabbed in the throat. Someone had tried to weigh down his body with rocks, but I guess the stones weren’t heavy enough.”

  That explained so much. Aidan’s wet clothes and boots, the cut on his hand, his calm demeanor on their last night of the expedition. He’d known that Heigler was gone for good. Surely the authorities would be able to put Aidan and Heigler together now.

  Then she remembered that Erik Heigler was Troy’s nephew. The poor man had already lost so much family.

  “I’m sorry, Troy,” she said.

  Removing his glasses, he began to polish them with the tail of his shirt. “I wish things had worked out differently. But at least now we know where Erik is.”

  “True.” She couldn’t generate a kind thought for the maniac who had attacked her.

  “Erik had a cell phone in his pocket. It was ruined, of course, but they were able to recover the SIM card.” Troy slid his glasses back on. “There were multiple texts that looked like they came from Kyla. And a couple from Charlie, who apparently was a friend of Kyla’s. Erik believed he was going to meet up with Kyla. But the messages couldn’t be from Kyla; they were all sent after...” His voice trailed off.

  “They’re all from Aidan,” Sam told him.

  Simon leapt onto the couch beside Troy and head-butted the man’s arm.

  “The authorities can’t find any evidence that Aidan ever communicated with Erik.” Troy’s voice was sad. He stroked the cat. “I don’t want to believe that Aidan’s mixed up in this.”

  “Believe it, Troy. I’d bet Aidan got interested when Kyla showed him the message from Klapton about working up here. Aidan doesn’t strike me as a user, so he probably intended to sell heroin. His mother hinted that times were hard in that family.”

  If Troy was having a tough time believing that Aidan had known about the drug drop, she doubted that he’d realized that Aidan most likely killed his nephew. She decided not to bring that up. “Did the rangers find any other cell phones? Did they find the knife that Erik was stabbed with?”

  Simon climbed into Troy’s lap and curled up there, purring. “I told you everything I know, Sam.”

  She’d have to ask Greene, or maybe Chase about Aidan’s knife.

  The status quo was maddening. The events had coalesced in her head, but she didn’t have anything more than specula
tion to offer; there was no way to prove any of it. Aidan had turned in the drugs he was carrying. He’d been cooperative, leading the rangers to the supposed drop area. Then he had simply gone back to school.

  The front door opened and Blake came in, trailed by the basset dog. He’d been taking Sophie to work with him. Now she waddled over, toenails clicking on the hardwood floor. She sat in front of Sam and then, with a sigh, flopped to the floor, her head resting on Sam’s shoe. Simon raised his head to glare at the canine, and then hissed to show his disgust. Having made his point, he laid his head back on his paws and closed his eyes.

  Troy said hello to Blake, then looked back to Sam. “You have a dog?”

  “Sophie’s a stray.” Sam reached down to pat the basset’s head. “Kyla was feeding this girl, and I couldn’t leave her there when Chris went to Alaska.”

  Blake said, “She’s the quietest dog I’ve ever known. She seems depressed, but maybe it’s just her sad brown eyes.”

  Kyla’s eyes. Sam wondered if Troy saw that, too. She lifted the dog’s silky ear and stroked it, let it flop again. “She’s very sweet. I can’t believe nobody in Bellingham has claimed her.”

  “Maybe she’s not a native,” Troy suggested. “I read once about a dog that ended up halfway across the country.”

  Sam laughed. “With Sophie’s short legs, that would take about twenty years.”

  * * * * *

  In a phone call two days later, Chase read to her from the case file. “The autopsy showed that Heigler had only a few months to live. His liver was mincemeat.” He was back in Salt Lake for what he described as a “quick bounce” between cases.

  “If Heigler knew he was dying, that might explain why he was so desperate to see Kyla again.” Sam shuddered, thinking of the demon’s hands on her, his spittle in her face. “She was probably the last relative who would speak to him.”

  “According to Greene’s notes, Callahan claims he knew nothing about Klapton or Erik Heigler or about a planned drug drop. He said he was out for a nighttime stroll and it just fell into his lap. He also told them about cutting his hand and losing his knife in the lake. The rangers haven’t found it, but Callahan wasn’t very clear about where he’d dropped it.”

  “Damn convenient that it all happened at that particular lake on that particular night when everyone was drugged,” she’d responded. “Everyone except for Aidan. And me, but that was a surprise to him.”

  “So far, that’s only your suspicion.”

  She hated Chase’s habit of reminding her when she had no real evidence. “He probably went back for the heroin after the rangers were gone.”

  “No. Campus police are keeping tabs on him at Washington State University. He hasn’t left the area.”

  It was not a lot of comfort. “He could have had someone else pick the rest of the load up.”

  “Maybe. Or maybe Heigler had associates who collected the drugs.”

  It was a disturbing idea, to think that other criminals may have been lurking close by in the darkness as her crew slept on that last night. Was investigation always this nebulous?

  “I know,” Chase said. “It’s frustrating.”

  “Seems like Aidan is going to get away with murder.” Sam bit her lip. “Maybe with three murders.”

  “I doubt you’ll find this helpful, Summer, but about a third of murder cases in the U.S. are never solved. Or at least, never prosecuted.”

  “You’re right, Chase. Not helpful. Or comforting.”

  * * * * *

  Another week went by with no more progress anywhere, or at least none that anyone shared with Sam. She searched for contract work and tried to interest Sophie in playing with a ball or going for walks, but the dog seemed to want something from her that she couldn’t decipher. Blake started taking Sophie to the greenhouse on the days he worked, which was a relief from having to stare into those mournful brown eyes.

  Chase had not found time to come to Bellingham for a visit or meet elsewhere for a rendezvous. The last time she spoke with him, he said, “I have something I want to tell you about.”

  “I’m listening,” she’d said.

  “It will have to wait, Summer. This is something I need to do in person.”

  He refused to give her another hint. She tried not to interpret that as ominous. His voice didn’t offer any clues about what might be coming. The transfer to North Dakota? An ultimatum to commit to living together, or else? A break-up?

  Now, she hadn’t even talked to him for three days, which always ratcheted up her anxiety level. The last time he’d vanished from communication, he’d almost died in the Arizona desert and nobody had thought to inform her.

  Between job search stints at her computer, Sam worked on volunteer trail maintenance crews and paddled her kayak around the nearby islands. In the evenings, she read with Simon in her lap, trying to push away unwelcome visions of being left on the platform as all trains pulled out of the station. Nobody seemed to need her right now.

  Not even Maya, who packed up her tent and informed Sam she was moving into an apartment with a couple of college kids.

  “A social worker told me about a grant from this extended foster program,” Maya explained as she stuffed her sparse belongings into a duffel. “Housing subsidy and some college money for a year. As long as I have a part-time job, too.”

  “Sounds complicated.” Sam’s reaction flashed back and forth between relief and disappointment. She wouldn’t have to worry about Maya freezing outside in a tent or taking up her couch space over the winter, but freeloading remora or not, she would miss having the girl around.

  Maya’s young forehead puckered. “Yeah, it is sorta complicated. I only get the money as long as I work and take classes and have a place to live. My first class at the community college is tomorrow.”

  “What do you plan to study?” Maya had a sharp mind, but the girl had barely graduated high school. Whenever anything more interesting cropped up, she had always been quick to ditch class.

  The girl shrugged. “We’ll see. To begin with, I’m taking American Sign Language and English Composition and something called The Biological World.” Maya made air quotes with her fingers around the last class name. “And starting in two weeks, I’m working at REI on weekends.”

  Sam never expected Maya to be so motivated. “You’re really pulling your life together.”

  The girl grimaced. “I heard a lot of lectures this summer. Where do you want to be in five years, et cetera, et cetera. It makes a girl think.”

  Sam pursed her lips. She had personally delivered that lecture during the expedition and she didn’t have a clue where she was going to be in five years. Where did she want to be? Gainfully employed and still romantically involved with Starchaser Perez. She wasn’t making much progress on either front.

  Maya shouldered her duffel. “I don’t want to be living in a tent in your back yard in five years. But maybe I can still come to dinner sometimes?”

  “You’d better.” Sam hugged her. As she let go, she noticed the cell phone in the back pocket of her friend’s jeans. “Say, do you by any chance have some of those crew kids’ e-mail addresses? Like Olivia’s and Nick’s?”

  “Yeah,” Maya eyed her curiously, as if she thought Sam should have collected that information herself. “We exchanged.”

  Pulling out her phone, she gave Sam the two addresses before she left.

  Sam sent quick messages to both teens, asking how their contracts with their parents were working out. Olivia responded quickly: I think we have a deal, but won’t really know until college.

  Sam was relieved that the girl was okay. Nick didn’t respond. But the boy had seemed more interested in pencils and paper instead of electronics, so maybe he wasn’t glued to a cell phone or tablet like most teens.

  The calendar reminded Sam of a hike she’d scheduled with Kim and Kyla. She’d been eager to introduce them to one of her favorite hikes, the Maple Pass loop on the boundary of North Cascades National Park
. Early October was the perfect time to enjoy that trail. Sam decided to hike the spectacular trail solo before snow closed it for the winter, promising herself that the journey would be her way of saying a final goodbye to her murdered friends.

  When she pulled out her day pack for the outing, she found the small trash sack left there from her hike to Pinnacle Lake with Chase. Still thinking that trail could hold some clue about the murders, she was reluctant to dispose of the debris she had collected. She spread out a newspaper, dumped out the little bag onto it, and sorted through the collection, using a pen to separate the items.

  The torn candy wrappers might have a fingerprint. The broken strap might match another vital piece of evidence yet to be discovered. Damn, why had she thrown away that Mylar balloon she’d taken from the memorial? The killer could have left it there.

  The off-white button could be important, couldn’t it? It wasn’t big enough to catch much of a print, but it was a button made of shell, not a common white plastic one. A single red thread looped through its holes.

  That button felt like a puzzle piece she should recognize. She turned it over in her fingers several times, willing a memory to surface.

  One finally bobbed up: Nick Lewis was missing a button like this from his shirt sleeve.

  What were the odds that this was his button? One in a million?

  Maybe not that low. Nick lived near Everett, which wasn’t all that far from the Mountain Loop Highway and the Pinnacle Lake Trail. He said he and his dad hiked from time to time. All the litter along the trail once belonged to someone hiking there. There were only so many trails in the Cascades, and enthusiastic hikers could explore many of them in a season. She often spied names of friends in the damp pages of the register at a trailhead.

  She slipped the button into a sandwich bag for safekeeping. She’d find Nick’s address, take the button to him one day soon. It would provide a good excuse to check up on the teen; make sure he was not cutting himself again.