“Wanted to know if I could talk Frank into letting her help with the search. Says she knows the kids and is worried about them.”
I’m afraid I took it out on the bread. “Really.”
“Told her I was sorry, but she knew as well as I did that I couldn’t help her out. Reminded her that I wasn’t going up with the local SAR team, since I’ve left it.”
“What did she say to that?”
“We argued. What did Frank have to say?”
I received the required oath of secrecy and quickly filled them in on our conversation, then handed Ethan’s second sandwich to him. He looked at its squashed edges and said, “Ten-yard penalty for unnecessary roughness.”
I ignored him and said, “Excuse me a minute-I need to get something out of Ethan’s room.”
As I went down the hall, I heard Ethan sigh and say, “My belongings, probably.”
I came back with the Thomas Brothers Guide for San Bernardino County and a set of USGS topographical maps. I went to the table that held the information Caleb had given me on Mason’s case.
“What are you doing?” Ben asked. “Aren’t you going to eat?”
I asked him to pass my plate over to me. “I’m going to see where a hunch leads me. I keep thinking about what Elisa said about comfort zones.” He exchanged a look with Ethan, and they both went to work on their meals. They watched as I checked my notes and opened the Thomas Guide.
“The problem, I think, is that we’ve forgotten Mason. Well, we haven’t, but I think the police have.”
“What do you mean?”
“First of all, he’s alive.”
For a second or two, they looked at me as if I’d gone simpleminded. Then Ben said, “And we know that Cleo isn’t reluctant to kill.”
“Exactly. I think she was supposed to keep him alive, frame him for Richard’s murder and for Jenny’s supposed murder. If he stood trial and the public believed he did it, then no one was going to expect their neighbor kid to be Jenny.”
“So what are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking that the last time anyone saw Mason Fletcher before he was found by Tadeo Garcia was the previous evening. Leaving a party-what a perfect time for a woman to ask for his help, or slip something into a drink.”
“He didn’t drink, remember?” Ethan said.
“Right-okay, his nonalcoholic drink or his food. Or maybe she gets him to help her out to her car and jabs him with a needle filled with Versed. Or any other drug that makes it impossible for the recipient to remember events.”
“I vote for something in his nonalcoholic drink,” Ben said. “She can’t take a chance that he’ll remember her too clearly.”
“Okay, she slips him some Rohypnol-no odor, no taste, and we’re off to the races. He had to be kept somewhere-and his car had to be kept somewhere-out of sight while the murder of Richard Fletcher was taking place.”
“Right, otherwise he might end up with an alibi,” Ben said.
“Let’s say she’s drugged and abducted Mason the night before. Gives him the first round of barbiturates to make sure he’s going to be knocked out for the duration. She stashes him and the car in a place where discovery is unlikely.”
“Okay,” Ethan said. “Then what?”
“Then Nelson Fletcher-or Roy, or Giles, or-who was the other one?”
“Dexter.”
“Right. Let’s say Nelson, because we know he coveted his brother’s wife. Besides, Jenny had spent time around him and would probably be more willing to walk away from the studio with him than with the others.”
“Makes sense.”
“So Nelson and his deadly cousin Cleo stop by Richard’s office. Jenny steps outside with Nelson. Cleo stays behind to kill Richard.”
“Then she takes the trophy with her,” Ethan said.
“Right. She had to have it to frame Mason. I think that was a mistake, though-if Mason had committed the crime, why on earth would he take the weapon with him? Especially such an awkward one. Why not just drop it on the floor? It’s not as if he could expect to defend himself from the police with it.”
“But she feels compelled to take it,” Ben said, “because if Mason’s found without it, there’s not much to connect him to Richard’s murder.”
“Exactly. So she kills Richard, takes the trophy. Also takes the bottle of scotch-because she doesn’t know that Mason doesn’t drink-and the sample of Jenny’s blood that Nelson has left for her, and heads up to the mountains-which is where she’s left Mason.”
“A lot of driving for her.”
“True. Worth it to her, because she feels safe up there. After murdering Richard, she can’t be seen driving Mason’s car any distance. She can’t risk being caught with Mason and the bloody trophy in the car. Way too much explaining to do if that happened. And she has to have a place where she can control him without a lot of neighbors watching her move a man who is knocked out cold.”
“Is she strong enough to do that?”
“She looked pretty damned strong to me, but I will admit to being scared shitless at the time.”
“Being shot at will do that to you,” Ben said.
“Anyway, the mountain resorts have another advantage for her. Many of the places up there are second homes, and intentionally isolated from one another to some degree. Half the population or less may be full-time residents.”
“So she could take Mason up there after dark,” Ben said, “and come back down to Las Piernas in a different vehicle, and perhaps not risk anyone observing her.”
“Some cabins are cheek and jowl with each other, but I suspect Cleo chose one off the beaten path, and with a way to see this spot, and within walking distance of it.”
I pointed to a road on one of the Big Bear Valley pages of the Thomas Guide.
“That’s where Mason was found.”
“I understand the walking distance part,” Ethan said, “but why would she have to see it?”
“That’s a guess. I think she likes to be in control, for one thing. If she had to make sure that he stayed alive, she might want to be able to see him.”
Ben nodded. “Even if she wanted him to die, she might have a vantage point. Some killers like to observe the activity that follows a kill.”
“Add it all up, I think it’s likely that Mason was left not far from her mountain hidey-hole.” I started studying the topo map. “There are several places along here that would work.”
Ben said, with emphasis on every word, “Call Frank. And call the San Bernardino Sheriff’s Department. Tell them.”
He was a spoilsport, but I obeyed. I even turned on the speakerphone-“So that you won’t think I faked these calls,” I said. I got Frank’s voice mail. From the sheriff’s department, I got a polite kiss-off. Understandable. They wanted people with facts or sightings calling in, not theorists.
I hung up, and we sat in silence. Altair came up to Ben and started staring at him.
“Do you have Caleb’s cell phone number?” I asked.
He called it but didn’t hand his phone over to me. “Caleb,” he said, “does your mom have anything of your sister’s that I could use with Bool?”
There was a brief silence. At Ethan’s questioning look, I whispered, “His bloodhound tracks from a ‘prescented’ article. Altair and Bingle work in another way.”
“Great,” Ben said to Caleb. “Can you get her to take you over to my house? See you there.”
I saw the wistful look in Ethan’s eyes and braced for an argument. A moment later, he looked at me and smiled, then said, “I guess I’d better keep trying to reach Frank so he can be there in time to strangle you. I hope I can stay awake long enough to make that happen.”
“Ethan-”
“Don’t test my willpower,” he said.
“I won’t. But-thanks.”
“Better get some warmer clothes on.”
“Okay,” I said meekly, and hurried off to change.
Not much more than fifteen minutes later, Ben, Altair, and I were out the door.
CHAPTER 54