In the Clearing (The Tracy Crosswhite Series Book 3) Page 10

  Neither Élan nor Earl Kanasket had criminal records.

  Tracy also ran the men’s names through the Department of Licensing database and obtained current and available prior driver’s licenses. DOL’s policy was to purge older license photos, but Tracy had found she could often go back three to four license cycles—ten to twelve years. She needed the current photos for herself. She would need the older photos if she tried to refresh someone’s recollection about any of the three men. It helped to have a photo as close in appearance to the time of the event being discussed, like Kimi Kanasket’s senior photo. That thought made her scribble a note to also go to the Stoneridge Library to browse through high school yearbooks and old newspapers from that period to get a pulse of the school Kimi attended and of Stoneridge during that time.

  When she’d finished, Tracy called Jenny and told her she would be coming back to Stoneridge.

  “Your captain approved you working the case?”

  Jenny knew of Tracy’s relationship with Nolasco, since she’d been at the Academy when Tracy kneed him in the groin and broke his nose after he’d groped them both during an arrest scenario. “Not exactly. I’m using some personal time.”

  “I hate to see you do that,” Jenny said. “I could make some calls.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I lose the time if I don’t use it by the end of the year.” She told Jenny what she intended to do and said she’d call her when she’d checked into a hotel.

  “No sense doing that,” Jenny said, “especially if you’re the one footing the bill. You can stay at my mom’s. We sent her off on the cruise today with her sister. You’d have the whole house to yourself.”

  Tracy thought about the beautiful home on the expansive lawn. “You sure it’s no trouble?”

  “Absolutely. My mother will be thrilled to know someone is staying there. By the way, you were on my list of people to call today. Turns out the forty-year reunion for the class of 1977 is in a few weeks, and they’re planning all kinds of events. I’m anticipating there will be a lot of people coming back to town who remember those days.”

  “Good to know.”

  “I can help line up interviews if you like.”

  “Thanks, but I’m not there yet. And I like to surprise people.”

  Tracy arrived at the Almond farmhouse just before sunset. She parked behind Jenny’s black-and-white SUV with the bar of lights across the roof and the six-point gold star emblazoned on the doors. When she stepped from her truck cab, Tracy noticed a drastic change in the temperature from when she’d left her home in West Seattle. Her truck didn’t have a temperature gauge, but she guessed from the goose bumps on her arms and the shivers running down her spine that the temperature had dropped close to freezing.

  The twilight sky, a deepening blue, made it look as if an artist had brushed uneven strokes of magenta along the contours of the rolling hills surrounding the property. Shadows crept across the lawn and draped the fruit trees in gray light. Tracy turned at the sound of the front door opening, with Jenny momentarily obscured behind the screen. She pushed it open and stepped out, hesitated, and reached back inside. Lights illuminated the porch, stairs, and yard.

  “I was just appreciating how peaceful it is out here,” Tracy said as Jenny descended the porch steps.

  “A lot quieter when you don’t have seven kids running around the lawn,” Jenny said. “But that’s how I remember growing up. Utter chaos, kids running all over the yard screaming. We had a lot of fun when Dad moved us here.”

  “Thanks again for letting me stay.”

  “I talked to Mom today. She said to tell you to make yourself at home.” Jenny shivered and rubbed her arms. “Come on. I’ll show you around and get you set up.”

  Tracy retrieved her suitcase from the cab and followed Jenny inside.

  Jenny picked up several newspapers from an entry table beneath an ornate mirror. “Here are some articles about the reunion weekend.”

  Tracy flipped open the Goldendale Enterprise and found an article on the fortieth-anniversary celebration of the Stoneridge High School state football championship to be held in conjunction with the class of 1977 reunion. A boxed sidebar listed the weekend festivities, including a charity golf tournament and a Saturday morning parade through downtown to honor the members of the football team. The dedication of the school athletic complex to Stoneridge’s legendary coach, Ron Reynolds, would take place that night at halftime of the homecoming game against rival Columbia Central.

  “I’ll show you the rest of the house,” Jenny said.

  The kitchen had marble countertops and state-of-the-art appliances. Jenny pulled open the refrigerator, which looked a lot like Tracy’s, mostly condiments. “Eat whatever you want, but check the expiration dates. Mom never adjusted to Dad’s loss of appetite. We’ve thrown out a lot of perishables and cartons of milk the last six months. I also recalled your not-so-healthy eating habits and took the liberty of bringing over a couple Tupperware containers of leftovers. Nothing fancy. Lasagna and some chicken.”

  Jenny led Tracy upstairs to the last room at the end of the hall and flipped on the light, revealing a canopy bed, a large dresser, an antique white vanity, and a love seat angled to see out the window. Tracy set her suitcase at the foot of the bed and joined Jenny at the window.

  “Beautiful,” she said. The window looked out over the property to the rolling hills. The brush strokes of magenta had merged to a single thin line on the horizon as twilight faded and night encroached. “It reminds me of the view out my bedroom window when I was a kid.”

  “This was my room,” Jenny said. “Maria and Sophia shared the other room. It was a bit of a sore spot that I got my own room, but only when they wanted to use it as leverage to bargain with my parents. They were closer in age and liked sharing a room.”

  “It’s perfect. Thank you.”

  They went back downstairs, to the dining room. “Where will you start?” Jenny asked.

  “Earl Kanasket,” she said. “I owe him the courtesy.”

  “You found him?”

  “Hopefully. Last known address is on the reservation,” Tracy said. “Appears to live with the son, Élan. Records also indicate Tommy Moore lives out there. If so, I’ll pay him a visit as well.”

  “Give yourself a couple hours to get there,” Jenny said. “And let me know if you need anything. I can give you a tour of the town and introduce you to the Stoneridge chief of police.” Some small towns contracted with the local sheriff’s office, but some, like Stoneridge, also kept their own force. “I gave him a courtesy call and let him know you’d be in town. He has no jurisdiction, since Kimi died outside the city limits, but he tends to get his panties in a bunch easily.”

  Tracy laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

  Jenny looked to the grandfather clock in the front hall. “Speaking of panties in a bunch, I better get home and feed the kids. You need anything, you have my cell.” She handed Tracy a set of keys, and Tracy followed her outside. The shadows had reached the porch steps, and it felt as if the temperature had fallen a few more degrees.

  Jenny got into her car and lowered the passenger-side window. “Call if you need anything,” she said.

  Tracy watched the SUV navigate the perimeter of the property, then turn north. As the sound of the car engine faded, Tracy was again struck by the utter quiet. She imagined the sounds of a family sitting down at the table to eat, or to watch The Wonderful World of Disney after taking Sunday evening baths, which had been her and Sarah’s routine. The thought triggered a memory of her family’s unexpected trip to Disneyland, Sarah squealing on the Pirates of the Caribbean, covering her eyes in the Haunted Mansion, and the smile that didn’t leave her father’s face for three days. Their final night, as they watched the parade on Main Street, Tracy had asked him, “Can we come back, Daddy?”

  “I think we’ve worn the park out, don’t you?” he’d said. “But you’ll come back someday. You’ll come back with your sister and your o
wn kids, and you’ll make memories for them.”

  That had never happened.

  A psychopath had stolen that dream from all of them.

  A chill ran up and down Tracy’s spine, and she quickly retreated inside, where she put on a hooded sweatshirt. She brought the newspapers to the dining room table, sitting beneath a retro oil-lamp chandelier. In addition to the articles on the reunion, the newspapers were filled with small-town news—a report on a swimming pool feasibility study, the gardening tip of the week, and an article encouraging citizens to serve on committees to plan Stoneridge’s future. The centerpiece of the front page, however, was the reunion and stadium dedication. In the photograph accompanying the article, a man in khaki pants and a polo shirt stood outside the entrance to the athletic complex Tracy and Dan had seen under construction. The caption identified him as Eric Reynolds, the quarterback of the 1976 championship team and president of Reynolds Construction, which was donating the manpower, equipment, and concrete to renovate the stadium. The unspoken quid pro quo was apparently the naming rights.

  The article continued to an inside page with a collage comparing past and current photographs. In one, a fifty-seven-year-old Eric Reynolds, balding in a horseshoe pattern, stood behind a large man bent over as if to hike him a football. Reynolds looked still capable of stepping onto the field and playing. The photo was juxtaposed next to another taken forty years earlier of the same two men in the same positions but in their high school football uniforms. In that black-and-white photo, Reynolds had long hair and a bright smile. The caption identified the center hiking the football as Hastey Devoe. Time had not been nearly as kind to him as it had been to Reynolds. As a young man, Devoe had been big, but he’d carried his weight well, and his boyish features and wide-eyed stare made him look precocious. In the more recent photo, Devoe’s bulk had become slovenly, and his face had the fleshy, sagging features of a man who liked his food and probably his alcohol.

  The photographs made Tracy nostalgic. Forty years had passed. Half a lifetime.

  Not for Sarah. And not for Kimi Kanasket.

  CHAPTER 12

  Tracy awoke to the persistent crowing of a distant rooster. Unable to get back to sleep, she slid on her winter running clothes and headed out along the ridgeline. The initial cold hit her like an ice bath, chilling her to the bone, but she started slow, allowing her muscles and joints to loosen up until her core warmed and she could kick up her pace. About forty-five minutes later, after a quick shower and breakfast, she jumped in her truck and set out to find Earl Kanasket and either get his blessing or a kick in the pants—if he was still alive and still living at his last known address.

  After a little over an hour and a half driving along US 97, Tracy approached the small city of Toppenish on the two-thousand-square-mile Yakama Reservation. She pulled off the exit and drove through a main street of one- and two-story stone and brick buildings that had the feel of an Old West farming community. Large murals adorned the sides of many of the buildings, the elaborate drawings depicting late eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century living—Native Americans riding bareback on painted horses, farmers plowing fields behind the reins of plow horses, a steam engine billowing smoke into a pale-blue sky.

  Tracy’s GPS directed her along streets with modest but well-maintained homes to a T intersection and an expansive field of dark green that stretched seemingly to the horizon. Kale had become the new food fad. The address for Earl Kanasket was the last house on the left, a one-story blue-gray structure with an older-model Chevy truck and a Toyota sedan parked in a carport—a good sign, at least, that someone was home. The house listed slightly to the left, as if the attached carport weighed it down.

  Tracy parked at the curb and stepped out, approaching a waist-high chain-link fence. She reached for the latch to the gate but hesitated when she noticed two signs, the first warning of a “Guard Dog on Duty” with a picture of a German shepherd. The second sign depicted a hand holding a large-caliber revolver and the words “We Don’t Call 911.” Tracy took a moment to consider the patch of crabgrass on the opposite side of the fence, but she didn’t see any signs of a vicious beast. That didn’t stop her from keeping a close watch on the corner of the house as she pushed through the gate and made her way up the concrete walk. She treated strange dogs the way she treated the ocean. She gave each a healthy dose of respect and never turned her back on either. The porch had been modified to accommodate a wheelchair. She took that as another good sign that Earl Kanasket was living there.

  The screen door had been propped against the side of the house, the hinges rusted and broken. Not that it would have done much good—the mesh was shredded. Tracy thought again of the guard dog. She knocked and took one step back and to the side, her hand on the butt of her Glock, not interested in being in the line of fire in case either posted sign was accurate. Inside the house a dog barked, but far from ferocious, it sounded tired and hoarse. The door handle jiggled, and an instant later the door popped open with a shudder. An old man sat in a wheelchair, his weathered face a road map of years. Next to him stood a shaggy-haired dog, its face white, its eyes watery and unfocused. The animal’s tongue hung out the side of its mouth, as if the effort to reach the door had exhausted him.

  “Good afternoon,” Tracy said, employing her most disarming smile. One advantage she had over her male colleagues was that people were less intimidated by a strange woman knocking on their door. “I’m hoping you’re Earl Kanasket.”

  “I am.” Earl’s voice sounded as hoarse as the dog’s bark, but his eyes were clear, and so dark they made Tracy think of a crow’s eyes. “And who are you?”

  “My name is Tracy Crosswhite. I’m a detective from Seattle.”

  “Detective?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What would a detective from Seattle want down here on the rez?” It was a legitimate question, and Tracy didn’t detect any hostility or concern in Earl Kanasket’s tone. She figured at eighty-plus years of age, you didn’t get worked up about too many things.

  “A chance to talk,” Tracy said. “About your daughter, Kimi.”

  “Kimi?” Earl leaned back in his chair as if pushed by a gust of strong wind. “Kimi’s been gone forty years.”

  “I know,” Tracy said. “And I know this is probably a shock coming out of the blue like this.” She paused. This was where Earl Kanasket would get angry and tell her to leave, or get curious.

  “Yeah, you could say it is.” His thinning white hair was pulled back in a ponytail that hung down his back. “So what’s this about?”

  “Well, it’s a bit of a story, Mr. Kanasket. I wonder if I could come in and sit down and tell it to you?”

  Earl studied her a moment. Then he nodded, just a small dip of his chin. “I think you’d better,” he said, tugging on the wheels so his chair rolled backward. The dog also retreated with effort. Tracy shut the door and followed Earl into a tired but clean room just to the right of the entry. The air was stale and held the odor of a recent fire in the hearth. The furnishings were functional—a couch and two chairs for sitting, an oval-shaped throw rug over a hardwood floor for warmth, a flat-screen television for entertainment, and a lamp for light.

  As Earl positioned his chair so that his back was to the window facing the field of kale, Tracy stepped to a chair near the fireplace. Rust-colored dog hair on the arms and seat indicated that this was the dog’s preferred spot, but for now he remained content to be at his master’s side. Tracy sat. She’d given some thought on the drive about how to begin. “I graduated from the police academy with a woman named Jenny Almond. Her father was Buzz Almond, the sheriff of Klickitat County.”

  “I know that name,” Earl said. “But he wasn’t sheriff. Not yet, anyway. He was a deputy. He came when Kimi went missing.”

  According to the Accurint records, the Kanaskets moved to the Yakama Reservation not long after the recovery of Kimi’s body from the White Salmon River.

  “That’s right,” she said.


  “He said he’d find Kimi. I think he meant it.”

  “Did he tell you what happened to Kimi?”

  Kanasket took his time, seeming to ponder each question, as if age and wisdom had taught him patience before opening his mouth to speak. “They said she threw herself into the river.”

  “Is that what Buzz Almond told you?”

  “I don’t remember who said it, just that it was said. Didn’t believe it then. Don’t believe it now.”

  “Well,” Tracy said. “I’m not certain Buzz Almond believed it either. He kept a file, Mr. Kanasket.” She reached into her briefcase and pulled out the file, then stood and handed it to Earl Kanasket. He took it tentatively, as if uncertain he wanted to hold it, and Tracy didn’t blame him for that. The file documented the worst memories of his life, memories she was certain he’d take to his grave.

  “It appears Buzz Almond continued to investigate what happened to your daughter, which wouldn’t have been the usual way things were done in the sheriff’s office. The usual way would have been for him to turn his file over to a detective. So the fact that he kept the file indicates, perhaps, that he didn’t agree with the conclusion reached by others.”

  “What does he have to say about it?”

  “He’s dead. He died of cancer a few weeks ago. His daughter found the file in his desk at home and asked me to take a look. I came here to let you know, and hopefully to get your approval.”

  Earl’s eyes narrowed, and his gaze bore into Tracy with such intensity she was certain this time that he would ask her to leave. “My approval?”