Clearly she’d gotten too close to someone. Someone who hadn’t controlled their temper with Tabitha as well as Truman had.
He allowed the guilt and sorrow to swamp him for a moment. Guilt for getting angry with her and sorrow for the end of her young life. Both logical emotions.
Taking deep breaths, he firmly put away his sentiments to focus on the nuts and bolts of her murder. He’d used Ben’s car to block the road in one direction and asked Royce to block traffic in the other until more help could arrive. Lucas had already requested a crime scene team from Deschutes County and let the FBI know that a reporter digging into the Gamble-Helmet Heist had been murdered.
Is the case hotter than the FBI realizes?
What did she find out?
The FBI wouldn’t be pleased if a tabloid reporter had discovered something the federal agency had missed.
Truman stepped away from the car, the scent of blood and worse still in his nose. The crime scene team arrived in a white van at the same time Mercy pulled up. His heartbeat stuttered happily at the sight of her even though she was responding to a murder. He’d been asleep in her bed when she finally arrived home near midnight after Eddie’s shooting. She’d collapsed in his arms and shed a few tears as he held her and stroked her hair until she fell asleep. This morning she’d barely stirred as he kissed her goodbye three hours ago.
It’s odd seeing her work without Eddie. He silently sent good wishes to the recovering agent.
“Go brief the team from Deschutes County,” he ordered Ben. Even though the car had been found within the Eagle’s Nest city limits, Truman wasn’t going to attempt to process the scene. A murder investigation like this couldn’t afford any errors on his part.
I’ll stick with my simple vandalism cases.
Mercy approached him, concern in her eyes as she looked him up and down. She gave him a brief hug. “You look like crap,” she told Truman.
“Dead twenty-two-year-olds do that to me. Excuse me a minute.” He walked to his vehicle and popped open the back, then dug around until he found wet wipes. He cleaned out his nostrils. The baby-fresh scent wasn’t his favorite, but it beat the odors of death clinging to the inside of his nose.
Mercy moved closer to Tabitha’s car. Her face was grim, and Truman wondered if she was reliving her conversation with the reporter, as he had. At least Mercy hadn’t threatened her . . . he assumed.
Ollie.
Truman wondered what else the teen had discussed with Tabitha. Could it have been related to what got her killed?
Is there danger to Ollie? Or Mercy?
Both were approached by the reporter.
Dread settled in his lungs, and he counted to ten. He watched as Mercy bent over to look through the car window, the bulge of a weapon at her side. Her lips moved as she pointed and spoke with a deputy. She was a good investigator and capable of taking care of herself.
Doesn’t mean I’m not allowed to care.
He joined her at the car. “I poked around a bit for her phone and didn’t find it.”
Mercy grimaced. “Not surprising. We’ll get her cellular records from her provider and see who she talked to recently. I’ve already put a call in to her boss at the Voice. I’d like to hear his version of what she was doing up here.” Her gaze went past Truman. “Uh-oh.”
He turned. Fifty yards away, two local news vans had stopped, blocked by Royce’s patrol unit. The young cop was already approaching the drivers. “Ben!” Truman waved over the older cop. “Go make sure they don’t con their way past Royce.” Ben immediately jogged toward the vans. Royce was the most gullible man Truman had met. He put in a good day’s work and had a huge heart, but an experienced reporter would dip him in batter, deep-fry him, and then eat him for dinner.
Truman had turned away reporters yesterday. Sure enough, they’d been following up on the Voice story. Truman had directed them to the FBI, stating the Eagle’s Nest PD was not involved in the investigation of the remains found on Christian Lake’s property.
Now they were back. Two men shouldered cameras and pointed them in the direction of the car. One of the crime scene techs spotted the cameras and pulled a collapsible screen out of her unit and set it up between the car and cameras. Good.
Ignoring the press, Mercy spoke into her phone, circling the car and studying the inside. She gestured at a tech and pointed into the back seat as she continued her phone call. The tech understood and took several photos. Curiosity got the better of Truman.
“Find anything?” he asked Mercy as she hung up her phone.
“Did you notice the notebook on the floor of the back seat?”
“No.” Truman took a look. The notebook was mostly hidden under the front seat.
She picked up the book with gloved hands and flipped through it. “It’s packed full of scribblings. Looks like notes for her articles.”
“Sounds helpful. Maybe it will show what she’s been up to for the last two days.”
I hope.
“I called in the request for her cell records. We should have them by tonight.”
Truman looked at the little car. “This is a rental, so I bet she used the GPS system to get around. That will give you some of her destinations, and then ask the rental company if the car has a tracking device. Hopefully her phone will turn up. Possibly she uses apps that track where she’s been.”
“Crossing my fingers you’re smarter than whoever dumped her here. I doubt they considered the GPS might tell us where she met him,” said Mercy, handing the notebook to the tech for evidence collection. “You mentioned you talked to her?”
“Caught her watching Kaylie and me yesterday morning . . . Well, I assume that’s what she was doing. She claimed to be getting coffee.”
Mercy wrote something in her notebook. “What time?”
“About ten a.m.”
“Did Kaylie notice?” Her voice hitched on her niece’s name.
“No. She’d already headed back to work when I spotted Tabitha parked on the street.”
“You had words?” She lifted a brow.
“A few.”
Mercy waited, her pencil poised over her notebook.
“I told her I knew what she had written the night before about you. Told her to stay away from my family and the kids. She had some snarky comeback about Ollie being eighteen. Then I might have told her not to mess with Ollie and Kaylie.”
“Did you say it as politely as that?” Mercy asked, a knowing tone in her question.
“No.”
“Are you saying you threatened her, Truman?”
“Hell no. I was . . . firm.”
Mercy nodded.
I didn’t say anything wrong to her.
But seeing the dead young woman made him feel as if he had.
SEVENTEEN
“I need more people on the Gamble-Helmet Heist,” Mercy stated for the third time as she stood before Jeff’s desk.
“I know. Believe me, I know,” Jeff answered. “But with Eddie’s injury and Art’s shooting investigation, the whole office is straining to keep up.”
“Art didn’t even count. He was a lucky bonus for the robbery case,” Mercy complained. “I can’t do this by myself, and I’m being pulled in a half dozen directions. This is a high-profile investigation, and I know the media interest is getting deeper.”