Keeping Secrets Read online

  Keeping Secrets

  A Sam Mason Mystery - Book 2

  L A Dobbs

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Also by L. A. Dobbs

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  White Rock New Hampshire Police Chief Sam Mason studied the pile of resumes spread out on his oak partners desk. The steel-and-Naugahyde industrial chair he sat in let out a familiar squeak as he leaned back. The chair was a leftover from the post office that had once occupied the building where the police station now resided. The resumes were to replace one of Sam's officers, Tyler Richardson, who had been killed in the line of duty a month before.

  A wave of guilt washed over Sam at the thought of replacing Tyler. He'd been a good officer who had been shot down when stopping to help a motorist. A random senseless act. Or was it?

  Sam slid the middle drawer of his desk open. The sun's rays slanting in from the tall arched windows illuminated a small brass key with the number 317 stamped on top. The key looked just like the other keys in the drawer, but this particular key was no ordinary key. Sam and Sergeant Jody Harris had found it taped to the bottom of Tyler's desk after his death.

  There was no concrete evidence that the key had been hidden there by Tyler. It could've been under the desk long before they'd moved in. The post office had left all their old furniture, and Sam and his crew had adopted it, leaving their flimsy desks and chairs back in the musty town hall basement they used to occupy. But Sam didn't think the key had been there when they'd moved in. Sam's gut told him that Tyler had hidden it there, which made him wonder if Tyler's death really was as random as it appeared.

  Sam slid the key out. The metal was cold on his fingertips. He flipped it onto his palm and stared at it as if the key itself could clue him in to what exactly it would open. It was a small key, the kind that fit into a locker or post office box or safety deposit box, but Sam and Jo had searched every PO box, bus station locker, and bank in the area. None had been rented by Tyler. The box that the key unlocked and what was inside it remained as much of a mystery as the identity of Tyler's killer.

  He tossed the key back into the drawer, his eyes drifting out over to the main street of town.

  It was a typical New England town with a lush-green-grass common area and streets lined with brick and wooden buildings abundant with the fine architectural detail characteristic of the early 1900s. From Sam's desk, he could see a view of the mountains. The town was small, the area rural and filled with streams for fishing, mountains for hiking and skiing and fresh air. Sam loved White Rock and took his job as chief of police seriously. And, since he was responsible for the town's protection, he had to replace Tyler no matter what his personal feelings were. Tyler's death had left them understaffed, and an understaffed police force could hardly be effective in protecting its citizens.

  His gaze fell back on the resumes, and he gathered them into a pile, revealing the worn surface of the desk. It was studded with staples and old circular inked post office date stamps. Apparently the previous occupants had used it for sorting mail. It was worn, but the honey-colored oak still glowed despite its age and neglect. Sam wouldn't dream of parting with it--it came in handy for spreading out his notes on the cases he was working. Right now, they had no cases, which made it even more important that he start contacting some of these applicants while he could spare the time to interview them.

  Lucy, the German shepherd mix that was part of the new K-9 unit, shifted at his feet, and he leaned down, running his palm over her soft fur. Lucy had been a stray who had helped them solve a case. Now she officially worked with them full time during the day and came home with Sam at night. After years of living alone, he had to admit he enjoyed the company.

  "Well, Lucy, what do you think? Do any of these candidates seem viable?" Sam asked.

  Lucy whined.

  "I don't really see any that stand out, either." Sam shuffled the resumes around and placed them onto the desk one at a time like a poker player laying out his cards.

  "These two are a definite no." He pushed two resumes over to the corner, which left three. "I suppose I'll have to call these three in and talk to them. Might as well do it before we have any real cases to investigate."

  Police work in northern New Hampshire towns consisted largely of feuding neighbors, lost animals, and fence disputes. Though, lately, there had been a large influx of drugs, and Sam had been battling the crimes that came along with that. He thought he had an idea of who was responsible for the drugs, but no solid evidence yet. An extra officer would be a big help. The department was small with just Sam, his sergeant and right-hand investigator Jody Harris, and a part-timer, Kevin Deckard. Once he filled Tyler's position, he'd have another full-timer on board.

  He picked up one of the resumes. Gary Newport. Military service. Three years police experience in a neighboring town. He seemed like a good candidate, but somehow Sam couldn't get excited about it.

  "Maybe I'll like him better if I talk to him in person. I guess I should have Reese start scheduling some interviews," Sam said to Lucy. Reese Hordon was the receptionist, town clerk, and dispatcher. She was attending the police academy at night and had hopes to join the police force, but until then, she eagerly did all the administrative work for the police department.

  Lucy swished her tail back and forth.

  Hiring someone would have its benefits. Sure, it would be a new person to train and get used to working with, but it would also leave him and Jo more time to look into what had really happened to Tyler. Finding time for that was problematic because the investigation wasn't exactly "official." Sam and Jo weren't even supposed to be looking into it--the state had already given up and had shoved the case onto the back burner even though the shooter was still at large. But Sam and Jo weren't going to sit still for that. Right now, they fit Tyler's investigation in between their other duties.

  Tyler had been dedicated to his family and had lived with his mother to help with his disabled sister, Clarissa. Sam knew Tyler's entire paycheck went to Clarissa's medical bills. Not an easy thing for a twenty-eight-year-old young man to do. Sam could remember being that age twelve years ago, and the last place he would have wanted to live was with his mother. Sam had been married with two daughters at that age, but Tyler was single. Living with your mom when you were single could really cramp your style.

  Sam figured he owed Tyler's mom, Irma, a visit to see how she was doing. So what if the real reason was to go through Tyler's things and see if he could find any kind of indication of what the key in his drawer might unlock.

  He was thinking about the visit he and Jo had set up for later that day when a knock sounded on his door. Sam glanced up to see a shadow behind the textured glass window that sat in the upper half of the solid oak door. The door had also been original to the post office--only the gold-and-black stenciling on the door had been changed from Postmaster to Chief of Police.

&
nbsp; "Come in." Sam welcomed the break from having to look at the resumes.

  The door opened, and Jo popped her head in, her eyes falling on the stack of resumes and then up to meet Sam's. For a second, her wide gray eyes reflected Sam's own feelings. Guilt at replacing Tyler and determination to find out what had actually happened to him. And then she shifted into work mode.

  "Got a call, Chief. Nancy Ritchie on Logging Road Number Four. She sounded frantic. Claims Bullwinkle just killed someone."

  Chapter Two

  Bullwinkle was the White Rock town moose. He could be seen periodically in various parts of the town. Sometimes he'd been seen at the river, sometimes walking up someone's driveway, and a few times he even ventured into town and walked through the grassy common. He had his own Facebook page where people would post pictures of his sightings. As far as Sam knew, Bullwinkle had never killed anyone.

  Sam hit the lights on the police-issue Tahoe. Jo rode shotgun. Her yellow smiley coffee mug was snugged in her hand, tendrils of steam wafting out from the fresh coffee she'd just made in the department K-Cup brewer. She had her polarized Oakley Standard Issue sunglasses on. Her hair was stuffed under a navy-blue cap with WRPD stamped in white letters on the front, a few unruly copper curls escaping out the sides.

  Lucy had fought Jo for the passenger seat and lost. She sat on the folded-down seats in the back, her black muzzle resting on the console, her whisky-brown eyes switching from Jo to Sam as they talked.

  "So what happened? Did someone run into a moose with their car?" Sam asked. He'd rarely heard of a moose killing anyone except unintentionally when they smashed through the windshield of a car after being hit, or if someone was dumb--or unlucky--enough to get between a cow and her calf. Sam hoped it wasn't a car accident. Those were usually messy. Trouble was, he often felt worse for the moose than the person.

  "She didn't say." Jo sipped her coffee. "She was a little bit hysterical. Said something about it being out at the Donnelly camp."

  Sam turned onto the dirt Logging Road Number Four. Decades ago, the paper mills had come to the area and devastated the forest by cutting down the trees. It had been a big operation and controversial. Sam remembered seeing old pictures of giant logs floating downstream in the river. And clear-cut forests that made an ugly scar on the landscape. They didn't do much of that anymore. The logging roads still existed. The land was still owned by paper companies. Now the paper companies leased the land to people who wanted to build camps. The Donnellys had such a camp.

  Nancy and Bill Ritchie were waiting at the solid metal gate that blocked access to the road. The paper mills had installed them, and anyone who leased the land up there got a key to the gate. Nancy and Bill's camp was just north of Mike and Margie Donnelly's.

  Sam eased to a stop. Nancy must have gotten control of herself--she was standing calmly next to Bill. For a second, Sam thought maybe she'd just overreacted, but the dark shadows of the turkey vultures circling overhead soon squashed that hope. It didn't take long for the birds to find a decomposing body, and they weren't picky about what species it was, either.

  He rolled down the window and slowed to a stop. It being mid-June, the air outside was warm and fragrant with the scent of early-summer flowers. He could hear the silky whisper of leaves as the breeze passed through the trees, but the woods seemed eerily devoid of the usual noises made by birds and squirrels. Probably most of the animals were keeping away from the vultures.

  "What's going on?" Sam asked.

  "I was sitting on my porch just like usual, having my morning coffee, and Bullwinkle just came barreling past. He stomped right through my tomato garden and took off like a shot. He was coming from the Donnellys'." Nancy glanced up at the vultures, her voice high and panicky.

  Bill put his hand on her shoulder. "Nancy came running in. Said Bullwinkle was on a rampage. We've never seen him run like that."

  Moose usually just lumbered along unless something spooked them. Bullwinkle was no exception. If the moose Nancy had seen actually even was Bullwinkle. Sam had a suspicion the townspeople's sightings of Bullwinkle were really several moose, but he didn't bother to correct them. He was glad there were frequent sightings. It meant the population of wildlife was still abundant despite the current effort of land developer Lucas Thorne to ruin most of the pristine land in order to build a big resort.

  "Anyway, I walked down to the Donnellys' to see, because that's the direction he came from. Wanted to make sure everything was okay. It's only about a quarter mile down." Bill's face turned grim. "But when I got there..."

  "What did you see?" Jo asked.

  Bill glanced up at the vultures. "Something bad happened to Mike. I couldn't get a close look. All I could see was Mike lying on the ground, and the vultures..." Bill paused to take a deep breath. "Well, they were practically covering him. It was too late to help him, so I ran back and waited for you to come."

  Sam and Jo left the gate open so the medical examiner and Kevin could get in. The Donnelly cabin was exactly as Bill had described. A pair of denim-clad legs were on the ground just beside the porch, the rest of the body obscured by vultures. Even outdoors, the putrid smell of death hung in the air. One red squirrel sat on a pine branch, chirping at them--otherwise, the only animals that could be seen were the vultures.

  Bill and Nancy hung back in the driveway while Jo and Sam approached the body. The vultures flapped away as they got close, roosting in the trees and looking down at Sam and Jo, angry that they had interrupted their meal.

  "Holy crap, there's hardly anything left," Jo said.

  Lucy wore a dark-blue vest with K-9 Police stamped on the side in white. She sniffed at the body cautiously, working her way from the feet to what was left of the head, and back. She snarled at a vulture that had flown to the ground and was brave enough to try to venture too close. She went back to the hands then whined and looked up at Sam. He made the signal, and she trotted back to his side.

  "Is it Mike?" Jo stood at the head, looking down.

  "I assume so." To be honest, Sam couldn't tell. The birds had made short work of the flesh that wasn't covered by clothing, so his face and hands were a bloody pulp.

  The sound of a car in the driveway garnered their attention, and Sam turned to see the medical examiner van pull up. Sam was more than happy to turn the body over to him.

  John Dudley, the county medical examiner, got out of the van holding a black crime scene bag and came to stand beside Jo and Sam. They all looked down at the body.

  "Sure is a messy one," John said.

  "Yeah, no kidding," Jo answered.

  John squatted beside the body and got to work with his tools, measuring this and probing that, and then putting various things into plastic bags.

  Sam took the time to study the scene. He had a good eye for details and was looking for some kind of a clue as to what might have happened. Near as he could tell, Mike--or whoever the body was--had been standing on the porch and then had either fallen or been pushed off. The camp was a rough work of old lumber and logs, as were most of the camps on the logging roads, which had been cobbled together years ago by the previous generation, who had leased the land in the first place. No one put much money into them, knowing they would be dismantled eventually if the timber company no longer wanted to lease the land. Mike's camp had a wide porch with no railings that was typical of the small camps in the area.

  Sam didn't see any evidence of a fight or any kind of disruption, certainly nothing that would be caused by a rampaging moose. Maybe Mike had a heart attack and tumbled off the porch? Or maybe he'd been doing something by the side of the house and spooked Bullwinkle. Was it possible the moose got scared and gored him, and if it was, what could Mike have been doing that caused that to happen?

  "You thinking what I'm thinking?" Jo asked.

  "Depends on what you're thinking." Sam and Jo had worked as a tight team for about four years now, and they had developed a close rapport, each often knowing what the other was thinking. Jo
was a good cop. A loyal friend. And someone he could trust to have his back. Sam didn't have a lot of people like that in his life.

  "I'm thinking something's not right here." Jo pointed toward the body. "Look. The bottom of his feet are toward the house as if he fell off the porch backwards. How could that happen and why?"

  "Heart attack?"

  "Maybe. But what are the odds of that? And I doubt it was a moose attack. Last I heard, they don't come up on the porch and rarely attack people."

  "Unless he was doing something to piss the moose off or she was protecting her calf."

  Jo shook her head. "This body has been here for a while. Look at the vulture damage. How long do you think that took? When Nancy called, Bullwinkle had just run past her house."

  Sam had already thought of all this, so he simply nodded. John, who was now going through the pockets, pulled out a wallet. He opened it up then looked up at Sam. "Mike Donnelly."

  "Well, that answers that." Sam looked at the head again. "Unless that's not his wallet. But the other question is what happened to him? Nancy said she saw Bullwinkle run through her yard. Could a moose have had anything to do with how he ended up on the ground?"

  John eased the shoulder of the body over so he could look at the back, and his face turned serious. He looked up at Sam then pointed toward the grass near where Mike's hip had been.

  "A moose? I don't think so. Not unless they've started carrying guns."