Grave Danger (36 page)

She lay in bed wide awake and mentally reviewed everything she knew. Angela Caruthers had been killed either by her grandfather, one of her uncles, her aunt, or possibly even Millie’s lawyer. She kept no notes on her search for the will. The only evidence that she sought the document was the tape of an interview she had conducted at least three years before her death. As far as Libby knew, Angela hadn’t transcribed the entire interview. She was careful. This explained the void in Jack’s and Dan’s knowledge of her research. She hadn’t wanted anyone to know what she was doing.

Did Earl, James, and Laura know their father killed their mother? Millie was a battered woman. The suspicion must have crossed their minds. Did any of them condone Lyle’s actions? Earl and Laura seemed to worship Lyle.

Then there was Jason. Handsome, sweet, kind, protective Jason. He knew about Libby’s research. He’d located the boxes for her but then put limits on her report. He had scratches on his arms that could have come from blackberry vines. As far as she knew, he had been in town at the same time as every stalking event. He had a key to this house and he could lose upwards of twenty-five million dollars if the will was located and validated.

Libby would never believe he was involved in his mother’s death, but he could be acting on behalf of his aunt and uncles now. He was smart enough, and this was a clever person’s scheme.

She didn’t dare go to the police. They already thought she was nuts. And if she did, the Montgomery family would find out she knew about the will. She’d be hanging a bull’s-eye on her chest.

Libby had no clue how to proceed at this point.
If
Angela had located the will, and
if
the will had been left where she found it, and
if
all her sources were still available, then someone else doing the same research could
maybe
find the document again. A lot of ifs and she still ended in a maybe.

But still, Libby had only one option. She needed to find the will if she wanted to exonerate herself.

Angela had access to the ancestral home and in the 1970s she’d interviewed people who personally knew Millie. Many of those people were dead now. All Libby had were Angela’s notes. They were incomplete and included absolutely nothing on the search for the will.

Who else stood to lose if the will was found? Was the lawyer still alive, ready to collect on his two percent? Did the now defunct union still have a three percent share? She decided to find out exactly who all the owners of TL&L were and the portion they retained. Time to know the enemy.

She slept fitfully and woke early, ready to begin a concentrated search. First, she developed a plan. Step one: set up a meeting with Jason to pick his brain about the structure and ownership of TL&L. He was the fastest route to the information, and she could cloak her snooping by making him believe it was for the report.

Step two: contact Dan Parker to find out who might know about Angela’s research.

Step three: make appointments to interview the Montgomerys again. She would start with Earl, using the pretext that she needed to finish his interview.

Step Four: find the will and clear her name.

Piece of cake.

She called Jason and set up a dinner meeting with him. She had hoped to meet him earlier, but he explained that a dinner meeting would be better because she needed to be holding her head high among the townsfolk. They made plans to meet at a restaurant at seven.

Dan Parker was out of the office. She left a message asking him to call her ASAP. She left similar messages for a few professors at the University of Washington who taught there in the 1970s. Surely they would remember Angela—if nothing else, her disappearance would stand out in their minds. They could hopefully steer her to other grad students she’d known. Perhaps Angela had confided in someone.

Finally, she set up an appointment with Earl Montgomery for the following afternoon. She was surprised by his acquiescence, considering he hadn’t exactly been forthcoming the first time around.

After each part of her plan had been implemented, she went through Angela’s notes again and listed the names of people Angela had interviewed and then created a database of all the relevant information she had on each individual.

She had reached her research saturation point by the time she heard a knock on the front door in the early afternoon. At the sight of the Corps archaeologist through the door window, she quickly keyed off the alarm system. “Dan! What a surprise to see you! Please come in.”

“I’m sorry, Libby, I don’t really have time to stay. The police interviewed me today—about Angela. I gave them the box of Angela’s research materials, but before giving the box over, I made copies for you.” He carried a carton into the house and set it on the window seat.

Excitement over having fresh material jolted her. “Thank you. I hope you didn’t get in trouble for making copies.”

“I was questioned about that—the cop wanted to know if you’d asked me to make the copies for you.”

Libby grimaced. Mark would hold her accountable for actions in which she had no knowledge or part.

“I told him you didn’t know I’d located the box, let alone made copies. I didn’t think I was doing anything wrong. Frankly, I still don’t, but the way the cop acted you’d think I’d mugged an old lady.”

“We had a little issue with Angela’s boxes,” Libby said.

“So I gathered. I explained to him that twenty years ago I packed everything of Angela’s that remained in our office and stored it, hoping to give it all back to her someday. When I was making the copies for you, I found some of my own notes in there too, stuff I’d misfiled. That box was as much mine as anyone’s and I had every right to go through it and make copies.”

“I’m sorry he gave you a hard time. His behavior had more to do with me than with anything you did.”

“Don’t worry. He has other issues with me,” Dan said.

His words confirmed her belief that Dan had been a suspect in Angela’s disappearance. She realized that finding the will would clear him of suspicion, too.

“So, tell me, how is the report coming?” he asked. “Will I have a draft on Friday?”

“You’ll have something. I met with Rosalie yesterday. She’s satisfied with my progress. Even if I don’t make the deadline, I think we can work something out.” Rosalie was more than happy with what Libby had discovered. “Angela’s research is quite…interesting.”

“She worked hard. It’ll be nice to see her research used at last.”

You don’t know the half of it
. “I was wondering if you could tell me anything about Angela’s research questions for her dissertation. I haven’t been able to find them and she covered a broad range of tribal issues. What was her focus?”

“I don’t know. Angela didn’t talk about her research. Maybe that box will contain something.”

“If you think of anything, will you let me know?”

“Sure.” He cleared his throat. “There are some rumors flying around…about you.”

At least he gave her an opportunity to address the issue. If she were tried and convicted with whispers and innuendo, her career was already over. “It’s been one hell of a week,” she said flippantly. “Finding Angela would be significant enough. Being stalked, attacked, and framed was a special treat. But I didn’t do anything wrong; my cost proposal will bear that out. I’m not worried.” For a moment she almost believed herself.

“Glad to hear it. You do good work. We’ve got an on-call contract coming up and I’m hoping EAC will submit a proposal.”

“I’ve already begun lining up my team.”

“Good. For what it’s worth, when you came up during my interview today, I told the cop that I believed the rumor about your finances began with Amy Seaver and it’s well known in the archaeological community Amy resents your success.”

That was a huge show of support coming from Dan Parker, and given Amy’s basic psychotic behavior, she was sure to boil the Parker family bunny if she ever got wind of what he’d said. Gratefulness swept through her. Her peers might stand by her.

“I also told him I was aware of the financial trouble you had with a client three years ago,” Dan continued. “But I didn’t hesitate to accept you as the consultant on this project because I trust your integrity more than rumors.”

She again felt the sting of tears, a sign of how fragile she really was. “Thank you, Dan. Your words mean more than I can say.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

“You already have.”

He left. She studied the box he’d delivered. She had six hours until her dinner with Jason and a new set of notes.

M
ARK STARED AT THE PHOTOS
posted on the wall in the room they had set up for the Caruthers murder. All the information collected during the initial investigation and now was gathered here.

Color photos of a living, smiling Angela Caruthers hung next to photos of a hollow-eyed skull looking up from damp earth.

A timeline was posted along one wall. He read through the dates and events again.

August 19, 1979
: Jack and Jason leave Seattle and drive to Spokane to visit Jack’s parents. The departure is witnessed by a neighbor. Their arrival in Spokane is noted by several people, including business associates with whom Jack conducts meetings throughout the following week. Jack is not unobserved long enough to drive or fly to Seattle or Coho.

August 21, 1979, 12:00 p.m.:
Angela leaves her office at UW. She tells Dan Parker she is going to collect research for her dissertation. Dan Parker is the last person on record to see her.

9:00 p.m.:
Jack claims he received a phone call from Angela, during which she stated she was in Coho. The phone company is unable to provide any record that such a call occurred. The call was not collect and was not made from the Shelby house, the Montgomery house, or any of the other houses the Montgomery family had access to in Coho. A search of pay phone records for all of Coho was not conducted in 1979. Pay phone information is no longer available.

August 24, 1979, 10:00 p.m.:
Jack reports Angela missing. After being unable to reach her for three days, Jack calls the Coho Police Department. A car is sent to the Shelby house. Officers report the house appears vacant. No evidence is found to indicate Angela ever arrived in Coho. Jack calls the Seattle PD, with the same results.

August 25, 1979:
Jack and Jason return to Seattle. After a brief stop to check their Seattle home for Angela, Jack leaves Jason with a friend and drives to Coho. He files a formal missing person statement in Coho just before midnight.

September 3, 1979:
Hikers camping over the holiday weekend find Angela’s vehicle on an old logging road in the North Cascades. No fingerprints or any physical evidence is recovered from the vehicle.

From there, the investigation was coordinated by the Seattle PD, because Seattle was where Angela was last seen, along with assistance from the Coho PD, where she was supposed to be when she was reported missing, and the National Park Service, who managed the land where her vehicle was found.

Mark’s own officers had pathetic little to add to the investigation:

April 9-10, 1984:
The Warren lot is covered with fill to level the area for paving.

April 11, 1984:
The Warren lot is paved.

This year:

July 12:
Human remains are found during an archaeological excavation at the Warren lot.

July 15:
The human remains are suspected of being a woman of Euro-American ancestry, buried just before the lot was paved in 1984.

July 16:
The medical examiner finds the clavicles on the wrong sides of the skeleton, indicating the remains were moved post-mortem and post soft-tissue decomposition to the Warren site on April 9th or 10th 1984. A fake spearhead found with the remains indicates the person who buried her knew the Warren lot was an archaeological site and attempted to make the remains appear to be a prehistoric burial.

July 19:
DNA tests confirm the remains found at the Warren site are those of Angela Caruthers.

July 22:
Mount St. Helens ash found with Angela’s remains indicates she was originally buried in Eastern Washington.

Mark looked at the pathetic list of dates and leads. Basically, they had nothing. No one knew whether Angela ever arrived in Coho on August 21, 1979. Jack had long been suspected of lying when he said he spoke with her that evening. Mark had spent several hours today interviewing Dan Parker. His story remained consistent with what he told police in 1979. He was forthcoming about the affair. His manner didn’t trigger any investigative instincts. He was another dead end.

Mark looked at a snapshot that had been in the Seattle PD file. Angela and Jason stood on a ferry deck, a much smaller Seattle skyline behind them. A happy grin lit up Jason’s face, revealing a gap where a tooth should have been. Angela had her arm around her son and laughed as the wind whipped her hair. Jason had his mother’s eyes.