Paranoid(94)

This wasn’t good.

“Kids?” she said, thinking they might be upstairs or down. But the house was too still, silent aside from the padding of Reno’s feet and the hum of the refrigerator. Don’t panic.

They wouldn’t go anywhere.

The house was locked, the alarm set....

Then where the hell are they?

*

Nate Moretti’s house, an A-frame with an addition that extended to a double garage, was tucked into a copse of evergreens. The lane that had wound through a stand of fir and maple opened to a small clearing where the home had been built, probably somewhere in the early seventies.

No light glowed in any of the windows, and in the mist-laden afternoon the house appeared deserted.

Cade rapped on the front door and waited for the sound of footsteps or the woof of a dog, or even a cough.

Nothing.

He knocked again, louder this time.

No one answered.

“Well, damn it all.” Voss grabbed hold of the doorknob and gave it a twist, pushed hard, but the door didn’t budge. “Humph.”

“Let’s check the back.”

They did, peeking through windows as they followed a trail of concrete rounds to the back, where the grass was untended. The remains of what had been a chicken coop complete with wire fencing, partially rolled away from the path, stood fifteen feet from the back door, the sides rotting, weeds growing beneath the raised floor, discolored straw littering the area.

“Looks like he could use a gardener,” Voss observed. “Or a wife.”

“Sexist.”

“Truth.” She climbed two steps to a back porch that also served as a sunroom, paned windows enclosing the area. She pounded on a screen door that rattled, then tried it, and it opened.

The inside door, however, was locked.

“No luck.” She sighed and they both peered through the window cut into the back door. Inside was a kitchen, clean enough, though time-worn, one of the kitchen chairs pulled out a bit, so as to view a small television propped on the table.

“No one’s here,” Voss said and they moved on, looking through windows and past partially open blinds or curtains but seeing no signs of life.

Next, the garage. It was locked as well, but a window on the side wall gave a view of the dark interior, where a workbench, clean as a whistle, stretched across the back wall, the rest of the space empty.

Cade said, “Not here.”

“And not at work. Lied about being sick,” Voss said, standing on her tiptoes for a view of the interior and holding on to the outer sill of the window for balance.

“Unless he’s at an urgent care. Or at a friend’s. Maybe he just took the day off and didn’t want the help to know he was playing hooky.”

“Or in the wind if he thinks we’re on to him.”

“If he’s the killer.”

“Yeah. So far, he’s got my vote.”

“Pretty sloppy if he wanted to get away with it.”

“Like I said, sex game that went a little too far.”

“Possibly.” But Cade wasn’t buying it. Something was off about the idea of Nate Moretti killing both women. “Let’s call him.” Cade already had his phone out of his pocket. He’d already put Moretti’s number into his contacts, but when he punched out the number and was connected, he was immediately sent to voice mail. He left a message, asking Moretti to call him back.

“So back to square one,” Voss observed as she let go of the sill and stood flat-footed again. “Unless you want to break in.”

“Not yet.” They made their way back to the SUV, parked in front of the house. “Let’s put a BOLO out for his vehicle. It’s a Toyota, right? SUV?”

“RAV4, 2019, hybrid.”

“You’ve done your homework.”

“Always.”

“Then let’s see if his father knows where he is.” He tossed Voss the keys. “I’ll run him down.” Then he was on the phone again and slid into the passenger seat as Voss climbed behind the wheel.

The day was slowly beginning to clear, clouds and fog lifting, visibility improving as she turned on the SUV, then drove back down the lane. They turned onto the county road and wound through the wooded hillsides before eventually connecting to Highway 30 and heading west to Astoria.

Cade didn’t get far with his call to reach Nate Moretti’s father. A receptionist who answered the phone at Moretti’s clinic told Cade that “Doctor” wouldn’t be in until four. Frustrated, he gave Voss the word, and at the next crossroad, she turned the vehicle around to head back to the station.

All the way back to Edgewater with Voss driving so painstakingly near the speed limit that he wanted to scream, he thought about Nate Moretti’s disappearance on the heels of his lover’s bizarre murder.

Had he met her at St. Augustine’s and, as Voss had surmised, their tryst went horribly bad?

Had someone else been waiting for them?

Was he alive, hiding out somewhere? Or on the run?

Or could he be already dead?

Cade didn’t like any of the options.





CHAPTER 29


Panicked, thinking she might have missed the kids calling her, Rachel checked her phone again for messages, texts, or missed calls. Nope. The living room was empty. Her heart began to race as she saw her bedroom and office were empty, so she hurried down to the first floor and then to the basement, hitting the switch on the wall to illuminate the darkened area.