My Sister's Grave (Tracy Crosswhite, #1)(7)
“Why do you ask?” Calloway asked.
“The glacial till in the Pacific Northwest is rock hard,” Rosa said. “It makes digging a grave very difficult, particularly in this type of terrain, which I’m assuming has an extensive root system. I’m not surprised the grave is shallow. What is surprising is that no other animals have disturbed it before now.”
Tracy spoke to Rosa. “That area was just starting to be developed into a golf and tennis resort to be called Cascadia. They’d cleared some of the trees and brought in temporary trailers to use as a sales office to pre-sell the lots. You remember that body we found out in Maple Valley a few years back?”
Rosa nodded and directed her question to Armstrong. “Could the body have been buried in a hole created from a tree uprooted during the development?”
“I don’t know,” Armstrong said, shaking his head and looking confused.
“What difference does that make?” Calloway asked.
“For one, it could be indicative of a premeditated act,” Tracy said. “If someone knew the area was being developed, they could have planned to use the hole.”
“Why would a killer use a hole in a place that he knew was going to be developed?” Rosa asked.
“Because he also knew the development was never going to be built,” Tracy said. “It was a big story around here. The resort was going to have a big impact on the local economy and make Cedar Grove a vacation destination. The developer submitted land use applications for a golf course and tennis resort, but shortly thereafter the Federal Energy Commission approved the construction of three hydroelectric dams across the Cascade River.” Tracy stood, walked to the front of the room, and held out her hand for Finlay’s marker. The deputy hesitated before handing it to her. She drew a line. “Cascade Falls was the last dam to go online. That was mid-October, 1993. When it did, the river backed up and the lake’s perimeter expanded.” She drew the lake’s new perimeter. “It flooded that area.”
“Which put the grave site under water and out of reach of animals,” Rosa said.
“And out of our reach.” Tracy turned to Calloway. “We searched that area, Roy.”
Tracy knew. She’d not only been part of the search team, she’d kept the original topographical map after her father had died. In the intervening years, she’d gone over it so many times she knew it better than the lines on the palm of her hand. Her father had divided the map into sectors to ensure a thorough and systematic search. They’d gone over each sector twice.
When Calloway continued to ignore her, Tracy spoke to Rosa. “They took down Cascade Falls earlier this summer.”
“And the lake receded back to its natural dimensions,” Rosa said, understanding.
“They just reopened that area to hunters and hikers,” Armstrong said, also catching on. “Yesterday was opening day of duck season.”
Tracy looked to Calloway. “We went over that area before it flooded, Roy. There was no body there.”
“It’s a big area. You can’t rule out the possibility we missed it,” he said. “Or that it isn’t her.”
“How many other young women disappeared around here during that time, Roy?”
Calloway didn’t answer.
Tracy said, “We searched that area twice and did not find any body. Whoever put the body there had to have done so after we’d searched and just before the flood.”
[page]CHAPTER 6
Tracy bolted upright, the bedsheet slipping to her waist. Disoriented, she thought the clatter that had startled her from sleep was the bell echoing through the halls of Cedar Grove High, signaling that she was late to teach her next chemistry class.
“Phone,” Ben moaned. He lay on the mattress beside her, a pillow pulled over his head to block out the slats of sharp, morning light filtering through the blinds. The phone finally cut off midring.
Tracy fell back onto her pillow, but now her mind wanted to continue orienting itself. Ben had picked her up from the shooting competition to go to dinner. In her mind she watched him push back his chair and drop to one knee. The ring! Her mouth inched into a sleepy grin and she held up her left hand, tilting the diamond to reflect the prisms of light. Ben had been so nervous he could hardly get the words out.
Her thoughts shifted again, this time to Sarah. Tracy had meant to call Sarah with the news when she got to her rental but then one thing had led to another with Ben, though Sarah apparently already knew. Ben told Tracy that Sarah had helped plan the evening. It was why Sarah had missed the two targets. She had wanted Tracy to win so she wouldn’t go off to get engaged in a bad mood.
Feeling guilty for having scolded Sarah, Tracy rolled over and checked the time on the digital alarm clock on the carpet beside the mattress. It glowed red numerals: 6:13 a.m. Sarah would never get out of bed this early to answer the extension in the hall of their parents’ home. Tracy would have to wait to call her.
No longer interested in sleep, Tracy rolled close to Ben, spooning his body and feeling the heat radiate from him. When Ben didn’t react, she pressed closer and ran her fingers over the ridges of his stomach muscles and took him in her hand, feeling him harden.
The phone rang.
Ben groaned, and not in a good way.
Tracy threw off the sheet, rolled out of the bed and stumbled over the clothes they had hastily discarded last night. She snatched the phone from its cradle on the wall in the kitchen. “Hello?”