What She Found (Tracy Crosswhite #9)(32)

boats passing through each year and as many as 250 each day.

With so many boats, there was no time to document each boat’s passing.

Another dead end.

After leaving the locks, Tracy called Mike Greenhold, who she had determined was alive and living on Mercer Island.

Tracy made the decision not to surprise Greenhold at his home.

After twenty-four years, she figured he’d be surprised enough just to answer questions about Lisa Childress, and he sounded that way on the phone. She also made the decision not to lie to him. She told him she was looking into the Childress cold case.

Greenhold paused several seconds before responding with the common refrain. “Has something come up?”

“No,” Tracy said. “Nothing specific.” Though each time a person asked her that question, she wondered what the person might be hiding.

“I’ve answered questions before, Detective. I’m sure those answers were recorded somewhere in the file.”

“They are,” Tracy said, though Moss’s summary had been minimal and not helpful. “Can we talk?”

“I’m retired,” Greenhold said. “And I’ve talked about it enough already. Too many times, in fact. I really don’t have anything more to say. Besides, I’m watching my grandkids this week, and that’s precious time for me and my wife.”

Tracy tried but failed to convince Greenhold, and with no real means to compel him to speak to her, or to bring him into Police Headquarters, it was, at least at present, another dead end.

Tracy disconnected the call and immediately received another.

No caller ID displayed, and she didn’t recognize the number.

“Detective Crosswhite?”

“Speaking.”

“This is Pete Welsh at the Diamond Marina.” Tracy hadn’t expected to hear from Welsh this soon. “We’re still looking for those records, but I think I found out who D. S. was, and a little more information about that boat, the Egregious.”

“Let me pull over so I can write,” she said.

“Actually, are you around tomorrow? I have someone I think you’re going to want to speak with.”

Tracy’s pulse quickened with anticipation, but at the same time she thought, Saturday. Family time.

“What time tomorrow?” she asked.





C H A P T E R 1 4

Saturday morning, Tracy met Pete Welsh in the lobby of his office building. The weekend had dawned gloriously, and Tracy regretted agreeing to the meeting. She would much rather have remained home with Dan and Daniella. Dan tried to make the situation better by telling Tracy he would take Daniella on a walk at Marymoor Park, but it only made her FOMO—an acronym he fondly used that meant Fear of Missing Out—worse.

“We’ll catch up to you at home in the afternoon,” Dan said.

Which was fine, except Daniella took her naps in the afternoon.

Tracy was back to seeing her little one in a crib.

“Thanks for coming back,” Welsh said, greeting her.

Welsh had given her some information the prior afternoon.

Dennis Hopper Junior had lived on a houseboat at the marina off and on since 1990. “He says he knew D. S.—David Slocum—well.

Slocum was the marina’s harbormaster back then.”

“I’m anxious to speak to Mr. Hopper,” she said.

Welsh described Hopper as a bit of a character and said he had frequently rented out the houseboat when he left to pursue work as a roustabout and roughneck on oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, as a greenhorn on Alaskan fishing boats, a cook working a small cruise ship between Florida and the Cayman Islands, and other interesting jobs. Welsh said Hopper had once told him he’d even been employed flying hot-air balloons.

Welsh led Tracy from his office and headed to the piers with more than 250 houseboats. “Hopper also served as the harbormaster for a short time, as I understand it, but the marina couldn’t really count on him. He picked up and took off without much notice and never knew how long he’d be away.”

They emerged in bright sunshine with the same glorious view Welsh had from his second-story marina manager’s window. Boaters pushed what looked like blue plastic wheelbarrows filled with boating equipment, coolers, and toys down the piers to their slips. Some greeted Welsh by name. Welsh punched in a code on a second gate across one of the finger piers. The gate had sharp arrow tips extending off the sides and the top to prevent someone from reaching or stepping around it.

Some of the houseboats were elaborate and beautifully maintained. Hopper’s was best described as eclectic. Beside a yellow front door that faced the lake was a garage-style roll-up door.

The second story was stacked over the first and looked to have been added on. Welsh rang the bell, which elicited a voice from above.

“That you, Pete?”

Welsh looked at Tracy and smiled. They stepped back from the door and looked up at a wiry-thin, shirtless man with a silver ponytail leaning over the second story. His skin was the color of a weathered, well-oiled baseball mitt. “How are you this morning, Dennis?” Welsh said.

“I’m good. Just soaking up some vitamin D. Got the plants out this morning and decided if it was good for the plants, it was good for me.”

“The legal plants, right?”

“Of course,” Hopper said. He looked to Tracy. “You must be the detective.”