“What if Mike did it after Grace was killed?” Mattie asked. “He had a dog bite on his hand. Maybe it didn’t come from one of his dogs. Maybe it came from Belle, and that’s how she got away.”
McCoy nodded. “What if Grace was driving to school, spotted Mike Chadron, followed him up to the cabin, and ran into someone involved in bagging the cocaine? That someone might’ve killed her and then killed Mike, the only witness, a day later.”
“That’s what I’ve been thinking,” Stella said, giving them her too-sweet smile. “Now, just a couple more points here. One, Chadron’s truck was parked in a shed on his property, but his trailer and dogs are still missing. God knows what happened to those poor creatures. And two, both the box of rat poison and the packets of cocaine that we found at his house were wiped clean. No fingerprints at all. Why would a person wipe these items clean and then leave them in spots where we’d be most likely to find them? They were planted.”
Mattie agreed with Stella’s reasoning, and she decided she might have jumped at too quick a conclusion that Mike Chadron tried to poison Robo. She felt some guilt for wanting to kick a dead man’s ass, but only a small amount, because it still looked like the guy had abused his own dogs and possibly Belle, too.
“So,” Sheriff McCoy said. “What’s our focus?”
Looking reflective, Stella said, “We’ve got to stay on this drug trafficking lead. That means we’ve got to follow the money. Identify anyone who seems to have come into a windfall lately. Talk with people who might be users or dealers. Mattie, you went out to the hot springs. What did you find out?”
“The new owner at Valley Vista hot springs seems worth checking out. His name is Dean Hornsby.” Stella wrote that down on her board while McCoy appeared to record it in his notebook. “He seemed to overreact when I asked him about his business. Seemed too sensitive. Acted like a man with something to hide.”
“Nah,” Brody said. “I stopped in there and met him a while back. The guy’s an idiot, but he’s not the drug-boss type.”
“Okay . . .” Stella raised her eyebrows at Mattie, inviting a response.
“He says he’s from Phoenix, as is our murder weapon,” Mattie said. “And drug traffic through here started after he moved to town.”
“I’ll check him out,” Stella said. “Anyone else?”
Mattie noticed a muscle bulge at Brody’s jaw as he clenched it. “Local lawyer,” he said. “Justin McClelland. Drives around in a brand-new Caddie with plates that say, ‘Hot Shot.’ Moved to town a year ago, set up a law office. Not much business here, but looks like he can afford an expensive new car.”
“Okay,” Stella said, writing down the name. “I’ll check him out, too.”
Mattie added to the list. “There’s Tommy O’Malley, a local teen. I talked to him yesterday. Denies any knowledge, but rumor has it that he might sell drugs, smokes pot, but no known report of cocaine use.”
“Got a juvie record?” Stella said.
“No, just littering and loitering, small-town troublemaking. No arrests yet.”
Brody muttered, “Soft.”
Mattie ignored him and went on. “Money’s tight with the family, and he says he and his dad just found work. I’ll follow up on that and find out if it’s legitimate work or not.”
“Let’s poke around some before we jump on him. It’s unlikely he’s a drug boss, but he may be on the verge of getting involved on some level. Mattie, can you take the lead on him?”
“Sure. We’ve already mixed it up a time or two. I can take him.”
“See what you can find out about his new place of employment, and see if you can uncover a cocaine connection. Since he’s a minor, let’s keep him off the board but still keep him in our sights,” Stella said. “Anyone else?”
Stella waited and then continued when there was no response. “We’ve still got a BOLO out on the dog trailer and our first victim’s car. If we find the dog trailer, maybe we’ll find the dogs, but it’s probably too late to determine whether or not they’ve been used as mules. What’s your take on that, Mattie?”
“Twenty-four to forty-eight hours. If they ate meat tainted with salmonella, sooner.”
“So we’re at forty-eight hours this morning.” Stella screwed up her face in a grimace. “They’ve pooped out the cocaine by now.”
Mattie agreed. “Most likely.”
“We’ve still got Belle.”
Again, Robo raised his head to look at Stella.
“What, now you know your girlfriend’s name, too?” she asked him, and then went back to business. “I agree with Sheriff McCoy that we need to look for any connections between Dr. Dennis Brinkman, that Phoenix golf tournament, and Timber Creek. I’ll work that angle, ask this Mr. Hornsby if he plays golf, and Brody, you see if you can come up with something, too.”
As Mattie noticed Brody’s neck flush red again, she realized with a start that if this were a poker game, she’d been observing a series of “tells” in the man throughout the meeting.
Interesting.
“I still need Cobb on patrol this afternoon,” Brody said.
“I’ve got it,” Mattie said. “That’ll work out fine. I need one more contact with the O’Malley family today anyway.”
Brody turned to stare at her in his “big boss” sort of way, but Mattie responded with a little shrug to indicate she couldn’t care less, and he turned back to Stella.
“Is that all?” he asked.
“For now,” she said. “We’ve got a good case building here, troops, even if we don’t have someone to arrest yet. We’re making some good progress.”
On their way out of the report room, Rainbow stopped them by holding up one finger. Taking her phone from her ear and pressing the hold button, she said, “Sheriff, I’ve got that ranger you’ve been talking to, Sandy Benson, on line one. She says she needs to speak with you ASAP. She’s got urgent news. I don’t know what about, she didn’t want to tell me.”
“Wait here,” McCoy told the group, hurrying to his office. “I’ll take it in here, Rainbow.”
Mattie felt like she’d been left hanging. She glanced at Brody, curious if she could observe another strange reaction, but he had gone to his in basket and was shuffling through his mail. Stella opened a notebook she carried and started making notes, presumably from the meeting.
When her gaze traveled to Rainbow, the dispatcher smiled and asked, “Do you have time for lunch, Mattie?”
Stella glanced her way and raised one brow.
“No, I’ll have to grab something on the run.”
“I wondered if you wanted to sit here, you know, if you brought your lunch with you today and didn’t want to eat in the car or back in your office or something. I thought we could just sit here and talk, you know, pass the time.”
Mattie liked to eat lunch alone, but Rainbow looked so hopeful that she hated to disappoint her. “Maybe another time.”
Stella pursed her lips with distaste and went back to her notebook. Thankfully, the sheriff came out of his office to break the tension.
“Good news,” he said, his face set with purpose. “A ranger found Grace Hartman’s car. I’ve got a location. Deputy Cobb, I want you and Robo to come with us. Detective, you ride with me.”
Brody glared at Mattie.
“I’ll get back on patrol as soon as I return to town,” she said. “I’ll report back in.”
McCoy looked at Brody and spoke in a voice that discouraged argument. “We need the dog’s nose to check out this car for even the slightest amount of drugs. This is priority for the K-9 unit. I think we can be a car short on patrol for a few hours.”