Rainey with a Chance of Hale (A Rainey Bell Thriller Book 6) Read online

  Rainey hoped the sarcasm wasn’t lost on Chance and doubted that it was, as she met his glare. The stare-off ended seconds later when, after a quick knock, Border Agent Santee entered the room escorting the tall redhead Rainey and Hébert encountered at the Hale home earlier.

  Santee said as he entered, “Here he is ma’am. Safe, sound, and well fed.”

  Fully awake now and dressed for the weather, Jean Berry’s deeply crimson hair made her head appear to glow inside the white fur-lined parka she wore. Rainey had guessed her to be in her mid-forties when they first met, but fully dolled up and coiffed, she appeared to fit more in the mid to late thirties range. Even as she gave the impression of a much younger woman, Jean Berry’s look was pure 1930s soundstage starlet. She had painted highly arched brows over darkly lined and long-lashed eyes. Her poisoned apple red tinted full lips of a starlet from the golden era of Hollywood pursed into a smile. The style was so out of place, it was startling but expertly done.

  She pushed past Santee and with a hand extended in Rainey’s direction said, “Hello, I’m Jean Berry. You were at the house this morning, weren’t you? I’m sorry, with all the drama of the day, I don’t recall your name.”

  Rainey noted Jean’s discourteous attitude from the morning had been replaced with the “nice” woman Hébert had described.

  Taking the offered hand, she answered, “Special Agent Bell, FBI, ma’am. I’m glad you were not injured in the explosion.”

  “As it turns out, that is a well-built old house. Thank goodness. I seem to have faired better than you. Keep ointment on those little cuts, so you don’t scar, dear.” She glanced at Chance and then returned her attention to Rainey. “This has all been so upsetting. Thank you for looking after our boy until I could come for him.”

  “I’m sorry, ma’am. I don’t recall learning your relationship to Chance.”

  The redhead left Rainey and strode quickly to Chance’s side. She hugged his head to her breast and cooed to him, “I’m so sorry hon. I’m so sorry about all this.”

  Chance seemed taken aback by the affection, but relaxed into a smile, he aimed at Rainey. His rescue was underway, and he knew it.

  Jean bent to his ear and whispered something, before turning to respond to Rainey’s inquiry. She pulled away, looked Chance in the eyes, and waited for his confused but acquiescent nod in agreement to whatever she had said. Her manner remained friendly, but her tone took on a more serious air.

  “I work for Hale trucking, and I’m a friend of the family. I’ve known this child since the day he was born. Is he being detained?”

  Rainey watched the smirk form on Chance’s lips.

  “No, ma’am. Chance is not being detained, nor has he been questioned. He asked for a lawyer.”

  Jean Berry reached into her oversized purse for a small card case. She retrieved a card and held it out to Rainey.

  “The Hale family’s attorney is Horace Blackman out of Durham, North Carolina, but he has representation here as well. If you have further questions for Chance, please contact Mr. Blackman’s office.”

  Rainey knew the agents on the scene were coming to speak with Chance. Even if he had asked for a lawyer, she knew she would catch hell for letting him go. She attempted an end around. Jean Berry had said she was a friend, not a relative.

  “Ms. Berry, you understand I can’t release a juvenile to a non-family member without some notice from the next of kin.”

  “Well, aren’t you on top of things? I wouldn’t have it any other way,” Jean said, with more drawl than she had exhibited before, a sure sign of victory in Rainey’s experience.

  Jean reached back into the cavernous purse and produced a document, which she handed to Rainey.

  “Chance’s grandfather, OB, is his legal guardian. That’s a faxed document giving me authority to represent him in this matter. The original is on the way as we speak.”

  Rainey examined the document. It was exactly what Jean Berry purported it to be.

  The older woman patted Rainey’s arm, interrupting her perusal, saying, “You’re so sweet to make sure he’s with the right people. I truly appreciate your concern.”

  With that declaration, Jean gathered up Chance and marched him out the door. The two appeared to have practiced the exodus. Although much of his juvenile record was sealed, rumors and this display of behavior indicated this wasn’t Chance’s first interrogation room exit accompanied by Jean or some other family representative. If Rainey wasn’t positive of this assessment, the slightly demonic sneer of victory Chance gave her on the way out sealed the deal.

  Rainey called out to him, “Hey, Chance. I’ll be seeing you.”

  3

  April 6, 1998

  Behavioral Science Unit

  FBI Training Division

  Quantico, Virginia

  Escorted to the open office doorway of Supervisory Special Agent Robert Douglas Wood for her scheduled appointment, Rainey was told to wait there until called. She shifted her weight from foot to foot. Her hands went into her pockets and out again. She checked her watch repeatedly. She tugged at her suit jacket, picked lint from her sleeve, and generally fidgeted for nearly four full minutes.

  SSA Wood finally acknowledged her presence with a gravelly, “Come in.”

  He pointed to a chair facing his desk without losing focus on the file folder lying open in front of him. Rainey noted the citations and awards on the walls while she waited for his attention. This was it—the holy grail of her career dreams. Seated across from the man who would determine her suitability for a coveted spot in the Behavioral Science training program, she could barely contain the smile threatening to burst forth.

  Without looking up from his reading, SSA Wood picked up a pen to make a note and simultaneously asked, “So, Bell, would you like to explain why you have continued to investigate a case that both the locals and your supervisors have deemed closed?”

  Rainey saw her dream job slipping from her grasp. When the order came to report to Quantico for an interview, it had been a surprise. She had made it clear that assignment to the newly renamed Behavioral Analysis Unit was her career goal, but Rainey’s four years of experience as a field agent were short of the bare minimum for consideration. She estimated she would be in ten years before they looked at her application. With the tone of SSA Wood’s first question, it looked like it might be much longer, if ever.

  Wood looked up from his desk. He took off his reading glasses and used one of the earpieces as a pointer, putting Rainey squarely on the spot.

  “Well, spit it out. If it was worth risking yet another insubordination letter in your jacket, then let’s hear it.”

  Seizing the opportunity offered her; Rainey began to explain, “Sir, I continued to look for Alyson Grayson, because I don’t believe Joshua Lee Hale had anything to do with her disappearance.”

  Rainey paused for her superior’s reaction, which came bluntly.

  “Belief and evidence are not held in the same light in a court of law.” Wood motioned again with his glasses for Rainey to continue. “Tell me—on what evidence do you base your belief?”

  “Joshua Lee Hale’s victims were not well-kept teenage girls. He took women no one would miss right away, if at all—homeless women, some prostitutes, a few drug addicts, and as far as we can tell mostly First Nations women looking for a way into the states from Winnipeg. Hale made no record of any victims outside of that profile. His logbook said he was in Canada when Alyson disappeared. That is verified by the shipping dock where he picked up his load, and we have video evidence of his actual border crossing.”

  Wood placed his elbows on the desk and leaned forward. Rainey had dreamed of exchanges like this since the first time she attended one of SSA Wood’s Academy lectures. She was just one of many agents he couldn’t possibly remember, but she had never forgotten. Rainey listened intently as Wood attempted to poke holes in her theory.

  “It has been suggested Hale crossed the border without his truck. That maybe
he had a planted vehicle on the Canadian side and returned to get his truck later. How does that sit with your theory?” Wood asked.

  Rainey countered with a question of her own. “Why go to all that trouble for the neighbor girl he could have grabbed anytime?”

  “But it is possible,” Wood added.

  “Yes, sir, but the two girls in the lake behind Hale’s house—he had nothing about them in his meticulously kept logbooks. Joshua Hale recorded the interactions he had with every woman he carried down to Mexico. Yet, not one word about the teenagers in the lake. I find that odd.”

  Wood nodded in agreement. “Yes, that is an anomaly. Go on.”

  Rainey suppressed the smile and continued, “He hauled the CANAMEX corridor from Mexico City to Winnipeg. One of the victims found in the lake, Adeline Tuttle, was a college student from Greensboro, North Carolina, who went missing June 7, 1996. Greensboro is very near Hale Trucking’s home base, but nowhere near where Joshua Hale abducted his victims. He never hunted in North Carolina, according to his logbooks. The logbooks don’t even start until after he moved to North Dakota.”

  “Murderers lie, Bell.”

  “Yes, sir, but there are these trucker’s knots used to tie the lake victims, more ritualistic than necessary. The bodies were frozen and then placed in the lake, a more unique disposal method than ‘delivery to Mexico’ as Hale described in his notes. Also, the lake victims went missing between June of 1996 and December of 1997. Hale started logging his victims in 1991. According to Hale’s porn collection, he has some fetish preferences, but he isn’t into rope ritual.”

  Wood suggested an alternative to her theory. “These guys don’t always follow a pattern. They adapt. Maybe he got bored and wanted something new.”

  Rainey had known she would have to support her assertions if she ever made her investigation known. She had made the mistake of presenting her findings to her current supervisor, and now here she was defending her investigative instincts. Rainey had prepared for Wood’s skepticism. She took a deep breath and began.

  “I didn’t just check his log books. I also checked his company shipping records. He couldn’t have been the person who took the other girl in the lake, Inge Abrahamsen. She was from Minneapolis and according to her mother went missing on March 14, 1997. Unless she ran away—like the police first thought—and wasn’t abducted until a few days after her mother reported her missing, Joshua Hale could not have taken her.”

  Wood interrupted, “But again, it is possible she did run away and was abducted when Hale could have been the perp.”

  “Yes, sir, but hear me out. We don’t know what Hale’s signature was. We haven’t found a trace of his victims. The killer of the teen girls definitely has a signature—the head injury, the knots, and the freezing. It’s important to him.”

  One corner of Wood’s mouth curled into a slight smile. “I’m sure it is.”

  Rainey, excited at Wood’s apparent approval, hurried the remaining portion of her defense.

  “I discovered two other murdered teenagers who met the victim profile. Madison Parker, age fifteen, disappeared from Burke, Wisconsin on December 21, 1996, and was found in Sinclair Lewis Park in Minnesota thirteen days later. Sharon Long, age sixteen, went missing from the same Sinclair Lewis Park on July 3, 1997, and was found frozen, well really, she was melting in a field in North Dakota one month later. Both of these cases fit in the time frame, both had the same trucker’s knot binding their wrists and ankles, both were frozen. Madison Parker was taken and found in winter, so no one thought anything of her frozen condition, but finding the frozen body of Sharon Long in mid-summer drew the investigators’ attention to truckers driving freezer rigs. The trucker’s knot and the connected locations may be circumstantial, but my dad taught me there are no coincidences, only unseen connections.”

  “Your dad is a smart man,” Wood remarked.

  Rainey barely paused for Wood’s comment before adding, “All of these girls matched Alyson Grayson’s physical appearance, blonde, blue eyes, slender athletic build, and—”

  Wood’s hand went up in a “Stop” motion.

  “Okay, okay, you sold me,” he said. “You did all this research on your own time, I take it.”

  “Yes, sir. I made a lot of phone inquiries. My dad lives outside of Raleigh. The last few months, on my trips home from North Dakota, I drove the route and talked to law enforcement with missing teens fitting the profile. I could only find the additional two, but there could be more.”

  Wood challenged Rainey with, “If these are not victims of Joshua Hale, then who?”

  “There is one other thing about all these victims, sir. Each went missing while school was out, either over the summer or one of the shorter vacation periods. I believe someone else with Hale Trucking is also a serial murderer, and I believe Chance Hale knows who it is and/or is involved in some way. In either case, I’m positive he knows something about Alyson Grayson’s disappearance.”

  Wood leaned back in his chair. Rainey focused on how he slowly tapped the earpiece of his glasses on his bottom lip while contemplating her proposal.

  Wood finally commented, “That’s a hell of a reach—two serial murderers working for one company.”

  “I know, but I believe this whole thing is a family affair. I just have no idea how to prove it. If Chance’s silence about his father’s murders is any indication, loyalty is deeply ingrained in the Hale clan.”

  “The family that kills together stays together, eh?”

  Rainey nodded her head. “Sir, I don’t believe the Bloody Benders killed as many as this family has. And what makes it worse is I don’t think they are finished.”

  4

  September 26, 1998

  County General Hospital

  Durham, NC

  “Tammy, may I come in?”

  Tammy Lynn Gaskill brought her blue and bloodshot eyes up to meet the compassionate, deep brown eyes of the speaker. Permission to enter came in the form of a quivering nod from the patient in trauma bed three.

  “Tammy, I am Deputy Robertson with the Durham County Sheriff’s Office. You can call me Sheila if that makes you more comfortable.”

  Another silent nod from Tammy told the deputy she could continue.

  “Tammy, I’m going to ask you a few questions. Is that all right?”

  A dry, “Yes,” came from the bed. A cough followed, and then another.

  Deputy Robertson reached for the glass of water on the tray table and handed it to the trembling young teen.

  “Here, take a few sips. It’ll help. It’s always so dry in the hospital.”

  Tammy drank as if she had just emerged from wandering the desert. She handed the empty glass back to the deputy and spoke clearly for the first time.

  “I can’t seem to get enough water.”

  Deputy Robertson refilled the glass and gave it back to Tammy.

  “You drink as much as you need. It will help flush the drugs from your system.”

  Tammy drank again, while the deputy asked, “I’m told you just turned fourteen. Is that right? You can just nod if you want.”

  Tammy nodded and added a “Yes” between sips.

  “You attend Hillsborough Middle School, correct?”

  Tammy put the glass down on the tray table and answered, “I’m in eighth grade,” before pulling the covers up under her chin. “I’m just so cold.”

  Deputy Robertson stuck her notepad in her jacket pocket, before reaching for the folded blanket on the end of the bed.

  “Here, let’s cover you with this,” she said and tucked the blanket around Tammy as if she were a child of her own. “How’s that? Better?”

  “Yes, thank you, Depu— Uh, Sheila.”

  “Good. Now, Tammy, I’d like to hear your version of last night’s events. I talked with the deputies who brought you here and your doctors and nurses. I know you have been through a lot, and I apologize for having to ask some of the same questions you have already answered. I’m tryi
ng to find out what happened to you.”

  The previously meek teenager became animated, nearly shouting, “I don’t know what happened. I don’t know how I got there. I don’t know where my clothes are. I can’t believe this is happening.”

  Deputy Robertson relied on her recent Sexual Assault Response Team or SART training to offer support.

  “Tammy, you take all the time you need to be angry, to be sad, to be afraid, and back to angry again. You feel any way you feel. No one can know how this will affect you and you will have to process this trauma in the unique way that will work for you.”

  Tammy sobbed softly.

  The deputy continued. “I hope that you will take advantage of the help that will be offered you. There is no one-size fits all treatment for sexual assault, but one thing is always absolutely clear. The victim is never at fault. You are not responsible for what happened to you. I need you to acknowledge that you hear me.”

  Tammy nodded and took the tissue Deputy Robertson offered her.

  “Are you able to continue answering questions?”

  Tammy took a deep breath and let it out slowly, before answering, “Yes.”

  “Okay. What is the last thing you remember?”

  “I was at the river with friends.”

  “The Eno River?”

  “Yes, near Few’s Ford.”

  Deputy Robertson wrote the info down.

  “Were there a lot of people? Do you know the names of everyone that was there?”

  Tammy shook her head. “I knew most of them, but there were people from all over. You know, just kids from around.”

  “Do you remember how you got separated from the rest of the group?”

  Tammy shook her head, indicating she could not recall.

  “Can you tell me what else you remember?”

  Tammy searched her memory, taking a moment before she answered, “I remember the sun starting to go down, music, and laughing. I remember the smell of the fire pit. Then I see flashes of dark woods. I just kept walking. I was so cold. I remember being naked on the golf course when the cops found me. That’s it.”