Hanged by a thread, p.2
Hanged by a Thread, page 2
She didn’t even pause. “Keys are in my hand. We’ll be there right away. Maybe we could take Sawyer for lunch and then a little playground time before his nap?” Her voice sounded steady and sure, which was how my stepmother just was. The woman had been marching at war protests and fighting for civil rights in the sixties, and she was still a fierce warrior for justice. But she also baked the best breads and cakes, even trying her hand at chocolate croissants for me since I was still on a tight enough budget that I couldn’t afford my favorite bakery treat very often.
“Good idea. I’ll let him know you’re coming. We’re out front. Saul is in back, and Santiago will be here.” I stepped a bit away from the car where Saw was, blessedly, still watching videos. “I’m going to tell him that Saul and I found something that the sheriff needed to see but nothing beyond that.”
“Got it,” she said. “See you soon.”
Despite my disturbing penchant for finding bodies, I was not ready to talk with Sawyer about murder yet. I would not, unless absolutely necessary, lie to my son, but I also wasn’t going to try to explain murder to a toddler.
It had to be murder. No one simply dies and then somehow hides themself in the bottom of an elevator shaft behind bags of potting soil.
That was the curious thing, though. From her clothes, I would have guessed the woman died in the 1970s, more than forty years ago, but those bags of potting soil were pretty new. The bags weren’t breaking down and faded. I’d seen that exact brand at the farm co-op the week before when I’d been picking up chicken food.
So, recently, someone had tucked that woman’s body into hiding. I just couldn’t figure out why. If it had been me, I would have moved the body out of the building altogether, buried her, maybe. I knew from the ache that was slowly growing in my lower back that most people wouldn’t have been able to quickly and easily pile up those bags of soil like that. Goodness, it surely would have been easier to just, as crass as it is, toss her body over the bank behind the building and let nature cover her up.
I could feel the tightness that had formed in my chest when we found the woman growing big and threatening my breath, so I forced myself to think about other things, like those printing presses and the beautiful brickwork on the facade. I couldn’t have a breakdown in front of Sawyer.
With an aplomb I’d seasoned over the almost three years of my son’s life, I straightened my shoulders and walked back to him with a silly expression on my face. “Guess who’s coming to get you?”
“Santa Claus!” he shouted.
I laughed. “No. Better. Baba and Boppy.”
Sawyer tilted his head and squinted just a little. “Why?”
I sighed. “Because Mommy and Uncle Saul found something that Santiago needs to see, so I need to stay here for a little bit.”
His frown threatened to turn into tears, so I quickly said, “BUT Baba said they’re going to take you for lunch and then to a picnic at a playground. How does that sound?”
He smiled, “You come.”
“How about this? I’ll meet you there as soon as I can, okay?” I leaned over and kissed his round cheek. “Maybe you could get me a hamburger?”
His face got very serious, and he said, “I will do that, Mama.” Then he paused and put up one chubby finger. “And I will get you a milkshake.”
I grinned and sat down in the seat next to him to give him an awkward hug. I wasn’t about to unstrap him until Lucille and Dad arrived. “Can I watch videos with you? Maybe some BabyBus?”
“Sure,” he said and expertly clicked around to find his favorite video where the little pandas rescued other animals from a forest fire.
A few minutes later, Santiago’s patrol car pulled in next to us, and Sawyer started squirming in his seat. He loved the sheriff, but he loved the sheriff’s car more. “Can I play in Santi’s car?”
“No, Love Bug. Remember, you aren’t allowed to play in anyone’s car but mine.” I squeezed his hand. “Let me ask Santi to come see you though, okay?”
It was clearly a second-rate option, but it would have to do. I stood up and walked over to the man I was dating and said, “I’m so sorry.”
“Did you murder this person?” he asked with a small smile.
“You know what I mean.”
“I do, but, really, stop apologizing for being a good citizen.” He squeezed my arm. “We are, however, going to have to talk about your knack for finding bodies.”
I sighed. “Yeah. Have a minute to say hi to Sawyer?”
“Of course,” and he reached into his car, pulled out something, and walked over to Sawyer’s open door.
“How are you, Sawyer?” he asked as he leaned into the car. “Need a little something to play with in here?” He held out a paper airplane.
“An airplane,” Sawyer said and grabbed at it.
Santiago pulled it back. “Be gentle, okay? It’ll break. But you can fly it in here for a while, and then later, when you’re outside, it’ll go a long, long way.”
My little guy tossed that little airplane in the air, and it flew right up onto the dashboard. His delight was contagious, and as Santiago headed behind the building, Sawyer and I turned the interior of the Subaru into an airfield.
A few moments later, he couldn’t wait to show his grandparents his new toy, and as soon as I unstrapped him, he went zooming toward Lucille, airplane sound at top volume. She scooped him up and listened with delight as he explained how it worked.
Dad made his way over to me, and we strolled a bit toward the building. “Are you okay, Baby Girl?” he asked as he wrapped an arm tight around my shoulders.
I nodded. “I am. But gracious, that poor woman.” I leaned into my daddy’s shoulder for a minute. “Thanks for coming to get Sawyer.”
Dad looked over his shoulder at his wife and grandson. “You know that we never mind extra Sawyer time. One of the perks of retirement.” He winked at me. “Now, what do you think about that playground with the really tall climber? I’m considering that a perfect launchpad.”
I laughed. “Agreed. You might need to fold a couple more airplanes, though? I don’t think that one will be airworthy for much longer.” We watched as Sawyer sailed the plane right into a puddle.
“I brought back-ups,” Santiago said as he came around the building. “I’ll grab them.”
Dad reached out his hand and shook the sheriff’s before Santiago headed to his car.
“He’s a good sheriff,” Dad said. “And a good man.” He gave me one more squeeze and then moseyed back to the vehicles just in time to take an armful of paper airplanes from Santiago.
Lucille grabbed a reusable shopping bag from their trunk and quickly got the planes inside before they all ended up in the mud, too. “Time to go fly, Sawyer,” she shouted.
I walked over, gave Sawyer a big hug, and said, “I’ll see you at the playground soon.”
“Okay, Mama. Bye-bye.” He climbed up into his seat in Lucille’s car and latched the chest belt all by himself, and I grinned. He was growing up, and while there was a sadness that came with that, I was also glad to see him getting more self-sufficient, for his sake as well as mine.
Dad got him buckled in the rest of the way, and I waved until they were out of sight. Then, I took a deep breath and followed Santiago back around the warehouse.
The coroner and Officer Winslow, one of Santiago’s deputies, had arrived and come to the warehouse from a farm road next door. I was grateful for their discretion, even though I knew that it was as much about containing this story as it was about my son. I waved to Officer Winslow, and she gave me a small salute.
I stood a fair distance away from the back doors, my unfortunately growing experience with body retrieval telling me that they needed room to work. But I also knew I’d need to give a statement, either here or at the station, and so it was best if I stayed nearby just in case.
The stretcher with the body bag rolled out the door, and I watched as the coroner and her assistant loaded their van and drove away. I said a silent prayer for the poor woman in that van, that her family could now find peace and that she hadn’t suffered.
I turned away to catch my breath and pull my tears back, and something moving in the woods caught my eye. It was Saul, walking slowly through the trees down below the warehouse. He must have needed some fresh air while he waited, too.
Officer Winslow waved me over, and I stepped inside the building after her. She and Santiago had set up bright lights inside the shadowy basement, and I was glad to get a better look at what was down there because I saw, across the room, a long machine with a belt that looked like it was part of an assembly line.
“Do you mind if I take a picture of that?” I asked the deputy as I pointed across the room. “When we can move things out of here, I might want to sell it.”
“Feel free. Just be sure you face away from the elevator.” She turned back to her careful movement through the area around where we’d found the body, and I walked across the room.
I felt a little callous still thinking about my business, but if there was anything I’d learned from the previous two times I’d found bodies at my salvage jobs, it’s that eventually I’d need to focus on making money again. It wouldn’t serve anyone, even the victim, if Sawyer and I starved to honor some sense of respect that the victim wouldn’t even be aware of.
Pictures taken, I wandered around the rest of the basement, trying to stay out of the way while also keeping my mind occupied. I didn’t want idleness to send my anxiety up again. I was just about to turn the corner by the wooden stairwell we’d come down when I noticed a few boxes tucked under the stairs.
“Any harm in me pulling these out?” I shouted across the room.
Santiago stood, looked at what I was pointing toward, and said, “Just wear gloves.” He gestured toward a white box of nitrile gloves by the door.
I walked over, slipped on a pair, and returned to the boxes. The first two were full of spare parts for one or the other of the machines in the building, so I took a picture to remember to grab those when we were able to load out. But the back box was chock full of photographs, and I immediately carried the box over to Santiago.
“I don’t know that these are important to your investigation, but I thought you’d want to see them.” I held out the box, and Santiago nodded.
“Yeah, we’ll need to take them back with us.” He gestured to Officer Winslow, who took the box from me and wrote something on a slip of paper before sliding the entire box into a giant bag. “Maybe Paisley can help us organize the photos?” she asked the sheriff before carrying the box to her car.
“Now, that’s a good idea,” he said with one eyebrow raised in my direction. “Would you be willing?”
I thought for a moment and said, “I’m not a photography expert, but I’d be happy to take a look. Maybe tomorrow?”
“Sure. Mika could watch Sawyer at the shop?” Santiago knew my best friend was always willing to give my child the run of her store.
“I’ll ask.” I started to walk back toward the door so I could stand in the sunlight for a bit while I waited. “Actually, would you like me to ask Dad to come? He knows everyone in Octonia and has for his whole life. He might be able to identify some of the people in the pictures.”
“Yes, please,” Santiago nodded. “Great idea. I’ll sit in, too, and maybe the three of us can make some sense of why those photos are in this building.” He looked back toward the elevator shaft. “Maybe they’ll be some clues about who this woman was.”
I nodded. “If it’s not too many people, Saul might like to help, too.”
“Saul might like to help with what?” my gruff friend said as he stepped back into the basement.
“We found an old box of photos. Thought they might be important,” Santiago said. “You have time tomorrow to help us look through them.”
Saul grimaced. “Sitting in a room and looking through a bunch of old pictures? Not really my favorite use of my time.” He sighed. “But if it’ll help. Just let me know when and where.” Then, he looped his arm through mine and said, “Let me show you these naturalized daffodils out here.”
I glanced over my shoulder to Santiago, and he was smiling. “We’ll call when we need you. I think we can take your statements right here, save you a trip to town.”
Saul nodded briskly and then led me down a deer trail into the woods. The very first buds were on the trees, and the maples were beginning to flower. I could even hear peepers singing at the edge of the stream to our north. Spring was definitely on her way.
“That was odd,” Saul said so quietly I almost didn’t hear him.
“Well, for us, unfortunately, finding a body isn’t really that odd.” My attempt at humor was met with a sideways eye roll.
“No, I meant the way her body was tucked away like that. Why go to that trouble?”
I nodded as I stepped over a fallen tree. “I was thinking the same thing. If you wanted to hide a body, there are easier and more effective ways.”
“Exactly.” He stopped and studied a Jack-in-the-pulpit peeking out from amongst the shade from the trees around. “I expect Santiago will have noticed the same thing.”
“I’m sure he will, but I’ll also mention it, make sure he understands exactly how we found her.” I felt kind of bad that we’d moved all those bags, but at the time, it had seemed the right thing, a way to pay her some respect. Besides, if we hadn’t, we wouldn’t have found her remains.
Saul stood up and pulled out his flip phone. “If I knew how to get a photo off of here, it might help.” He turned the phone to face me, and in the thumbnail-sized image, I could see the stack of potting soil.
“You took a picture? I didn’t see you do that.”
“You weren’t down there yet. I snapped the pic and sent it to the garden owners to be sure they wanted to use it.” He closed his phone. “It’s the kind with fertilizer already in it, and I didn’t know if they were going organic.”
“Ah, I see.” I put out my hand. “Let me see your phone.”
He lowered his eyebrows but then handed over the phone. Within ten seconds, I had texted the photo to both me and Santiago.
“We better get back up there. The sheriff is going to want to take our statements, and that picture is going to give him a whole lot more questions, I expect.” I slipped my arm back through Saul’s and began to walk back up the hill.
It didn’t take long for Santiago and Officer Winslow to get our statements, but that picture had raised some new queries. “She was completely surrounded by the bags? She was sitting up like this when you found her? There wasn’t anything else in the square of bags when you began to move them?”
We answered all the questions explaining that we couldn’t see her when we began, that she was in exactly that position when we first saw her and that we took care not to move her, and that we hadn’t found anything else at all with the body.
Officer Winslow and Santiago shot each other a long look, and then Winslow said, “Someone wanted her body to remain here. It was important.”
“Just what I was thinking,” the sheriff said as he closed his notebook.
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“The person who put her here cared about her or this place, probably both,” Santiago said quietly.
“She was killed by someone she knew.” Saul’s voice was solemn.
This day had just gotten a whole lot darker.
3
Lately, I’d been watching Wynonna Earp, a show Mika had turned me onto because she knew I’d love the tough women and the monster hunting. She was right . . . but it was kind of playing with my brain about what might have been the reason that poor woman was left so intentionally in that warehouse. I was imagining rituals and portals that needed to stay closed and demons that rose again and again from the dead. The ride back into town to meet Sawyer, Lucille, and Dad was kind of freaky with all that supernatural speculation.
Fortunately, my call to Mika, who adored a good demon-chase on TV as much as I did, dispelled all that nonsense quickly. When I told her that we’d found a body and where it was located, she whispered, “Sounds like a lost love or something.”
I paused and then said, “You know what? It does sound like that. Like someone wanted that person to remain with a place that was special to her, maybe a place important to the killer or to the victim and the killer both.”
“Like maybe they used to make out all the time there in high school, but as they got older, the victim decided she wanted to move on. The killer got angry, killed her, and then kept the body there to visit.” Mika’s voice was breathy with excitement at her theory.
I chuckled. “Slow down there, girl. I was thinking supernatural ritual myself. Let’s not go all wild with the killer revisiting the body stuff.”
“Sorry. Too much Dexter for me, I guess. I went right to serial killer.” Mika gave a nervous laugh. “Does Santiago know anything about yet?”
“Nope, nothing..” I sighed. “Not sure he’ll tell me much when he knows either, which is okay because I do not want to make more work for him.” Recently, Mika and I had tried to help Santiago, and it had almost gone horribly wrong.
“Good point,” she said. “I’ve got to go, but still on for make-your-own pizza at your place tonight?”
“Yep. Sawyer is insisting that chocolate goes well on pizza.”
“I love that. Dessert pizza for the win. See you tonight.”
I smiled. I hadn’t mentioned that Saw thought chocolate and pepperoni were the perfect combo.
* * *
Sawyer and I spent the afternoon wandering the fields around our house. He found about a million mud puddles, and I enjoyed watching his blond hair bounce in the sun and catching the arcs of bird flight as a way to keep from thinking about the skeleton in the elevator shaft. By the time we got back to the house as the sun was starting to set, we were both tired and calm from the exertion.
