A Dangerous Identity Page 2

  “Well, you’re about to see it up close. I want you to go out there now and interview Bland about anyone who has been on his yacht in the past month. Get the names and duties of the crewmembers and a list of guests with the dates and times of their visits.”

  “Right on it,” said Amanda.

  * * *

  Bland’s home defied the popular perception of a survivalist’s bunker or at least Amanda’s idea of what one should look like. There was no attempt to hide its location or camouflage its purpose. A one-story steel and glass structure, it sprawled over two acres of an open field, more like the first floor of an office building rather than a comfortable vacation retreat. It was also surrounded by a low stretched-wire fence that provided no protection from intrusion but which functioned well as a warning to others to keep their distance. The structure invited curiosity but nothing else and was a source of resentment on the island. Bland had used no labor of any kind from the island for its construction but had imported all labor from the mainland.

  Amanda drove the cruiser up the gravel entrance road to a wide gate and stopped. She could see no microphone or speaker for communicating with the home, but the gate was not locked, so she swung it open and drove the cruiser through it. She traveled until the gravel road disappeared into the grass in front of the house. There was also no walkway to the front door. Someone had driven the SUV up to the entrance of the house and parked so that it blocked a direct approach to the doorway.

  Amanda got out of the cruiser and walked to the entrance, edging herself the few feet between the SUV and the door. She reached for the doorbell, but before she could press it, the door opened and there stood Tony Bland.

  “Are you collecting donations for the sheriff’s re-election campaign?” said Bland.

  “No,” said Amanda, somewhat taken aback.

  “Then I’m afraid I can’t help you with anything,” he said and shut the door.

  Amanda stood stunned in front of the door for a few seconds before she began pounding on it. She then held her finger on the doorbell button. She could hear the continuous buzzing inside. But Bland did not reappear.

  * * *

  Amanda spun around and retraced her steps in front of Callahan’s desk for the fourth time. She’d come into his office agitated and angry about her skirmish with Bland.

  “If you keep pacing like that, you’ll wear away the carpet. If we had a carpet,” added Callahan.

  “Okay, so if he’s not hiding something, why wouldn’t he talk to me?” asked Amanda.

  Callahan shrugged. “Bland’s conduct does raise suspicion. At this point we can’t force him to cooperate with our inquires. He apparently knows that. But he wasn’t being very smart. He’s piqued our interest in him. Also, it’s only a matter of time before he’ll need our services. We’ll see how uncooperative he is then. In the meantime, find out everything you can about Susan Gibbons.”

  Chapter 4

  A broad brush painted Susan Gibbons as young, white, middle-class, and moderately ambitious. The only child of a father who owned a car dealership and a mother who managed a real estate office, she had grown up in Kalamazoo and graduated from Western Michigan University with a degree in education two years ago. Her parents had died in a car crash shortly before she graduated. Her first, and only, job had been as an aide to the kindergarten teacher at the island school. She was well-liked by the principal, teachers, and staff, although considered somewhat shy. The principal had described her as being introverted but wonderful and outgoing with the children. She came to the teachers’ social gatherings—Friday happy hour bar visits, birthdays, weddings or baby showers—but had no close friends and no significant other. She lived alone in a rented cottage on the island. She did not own a car but walked or rode her bike to school. The last persons to see her were two teachers she said goodbye to after finishing one glass of chardonnay at O’Malley’s Pub on the Friday before her discovery on the beach. No one had any idea how she wound up nude and mutilated in the sand. That had been the extent of the report Amanda prepared for Callahan. He had not been satisfied. He wanted more depth. So, she had put down her brush and picked up a scalpel.

  * * *

  Anne Meara’s apartment was testament to a blend of thrift, ingenuity, and style. A teacher’s salary in Nicolet County floated well below the level of a king’s ransom, yet Anne had managed to decorate her apartment with tasteful and expensive furnishings. The steady resale of vacation homes on the island provided resourceful islanders with a trove of gently used furniture at bargain prices. Anne had obviously been very resourceful. But she looked out of place, even in her own artfully appointed home. She was tall and thin and had an angular and elastic body that seemed to bend and twist to impossible degrees. When she beckoned Amanda into her living room, she screwed her torso around so that she almost faced backwards and swept her arm even further toward the couch where she asked Amanda to sit. Amanda tried to put the image of an insect out of her mind. When Amanda sat down, Anne excused herself to make tea for them. When she returned, she offered Amanda a cup and then sat in the cushioned rocker with her back erect, knees together, and her mug of tea resting in her lap. Amanda leaned back on the couch.

  Before visiting Anne, Amanda had questioned her and two other teachers in the teacher’s lounge at the school about Susan Gibbons. The group interview took place because all three teachers had a free period while each of their classes had specials such as gym and music. Amanda wanted to get background information about Susan and learn the extent of the teachers’ familiarity with Susan’s life. But convenience had trumped thoroughness and maybe opportunity. In retrospect, Amanda realized what she had overlooked in the interview. Anne’s individual awkwardness or discomfort in the presence of the police now seemed a reticence to be forthcoming in the presence of the two other teachers. Anne maybe knew something about Susan that she was unwilling to reveal in public. Amanda had berated herself for her lack of diligence and was now making amends.

  “So, you like island living,” said Amanda.

  “It’s different. It takes a while to get used to, but, yes, I like it. I like the school and teaching. The kids are great,” said Anne. “Plus, my boyfriend is from the island, so I have another reason to stay,” she added and smiled for the first time since she let Amanda into the apartment.

  “What about Susan? Do you think she liked living on the island? It’s not for everyone,” said Amanda.

  Anne hesitated and then said, “At first maybe. Anyway, she never complained. That is until about a few months ago.”

  “What did she complain about?” asked Amanda.

  “Nothing specific. It wasn’t even complaining, really. She just left the island a lot. Whenever she got the chance. She’d say she needed to leave. That’s all.”

  “Did she tell you why?” asked Amanda.

  “No. I figured she had a boyfriend on the mainland or was looking for another job. You know, something like that. We were friends but not close. We did socialize occasionally, but Susan was hard to get to know. She didn’t talk much about herself.” Anne leaned down and placed her mug on the floor. “Sorry,” she said. When she sat back up, she was quiet as if thinking.

  Amanda was about to ask another question when Anne spoke again.

  “There was something though. Something she told me. Something strange that was out of character for her.”

  “What?” asked Amanda.

  “She said she was going to the Caribbean, Aruba I think. I thought she should be happy about it, but she wasn’t. She seemed worried. More than worried, actually. She told me that she had planned a short trip but that if something changed, she might not come back. At the time, I didn’t think much of it, just that she might want to stay down there or finally leave the island permanently. Most people not from the island don’t stay forever. But now I don’t know what to think. It was the way she said it—hesitant like. I guess I should have asked her about it. I don’t like to pry, so I was waiting for her to tel
l me why. But she didn’t.” Anne was silent again for a moment and then said, “I’m not being too helpful, am I?”

  Amanda didn’t address Anne’s concern but instead asked, “What made you think she was worried?”

  “It was the way she acted: quiet, but nervous at the same time, like she was arguing with herself about whether she should say more. That was the feeling I got.” Anne reached down to pick up her mug but leaned over the wrong arm of the chair. She became confused when she couldn’t find the mug on the floor. “I . . . I . . . I’m sorry. I’m just being silly, I suppose.”

  Anne sat back up in the chair. “Would you like some more tea?” she asked.

  Amanda stood up. “No thank you. One last question: Do you know if she had any close friends either on or off the island?”

  “No, I don’t. She kept pretty much to herself. No one came to visit her as far as I know, and she never spoke of anyone that she was close to—at least not to me.”

  Amanda reached into her shirt pocket for a sheriff’s department card with her phone number on it. She handed the card to Anne. “Here, please take this and call me if you think of anything else about Susan you can tell me.”

  Anne took the card and continued to stare at it for a moment as she got up from the chair. She then looked up at Amanda. “I’m so sorry about Susan,” she said.

  * * *

  When Dr. Carl Remy spoke of the dead, he voiced stories of their departures from this world—the ones that death gave them the courage to tell. There was no sadness in them, no regret, not even horror, only factual renditions of inevitable endings touched with resignation and occasional whimsy. But in that telling, the circumstances always revealed the dead for whom they had become, the secrets beneath their disguises disclosed. Remy had seen enough death as the county medical examiner to become a master storyteller.

  Amanda had read Susan Gibbons’ autopsy report several times but wanted to hear her story from Remy personally. As usual, Remy appeared to have slept in his clothes or picked them up from the floor and thrown them on, rushing out of the house. Disheveled didn’t even come close to describing his sartorial taste. Most of the time his wardrobe included a white doctor’s coat, which hid some of the damage from view. But not now. He adjusted his ample posterior in his chair and then leaned forward, clasping his hands, and resting his arms on his desk.

  “Would sliced like a grilled kielbasa be too graphic a description for you?” he asked.

  Amanda winced.

  “Thought so. Then it’s best you not see the body. It’s something you won’t forget.”

  “I understand that it’s your opinion that she died in a boating accident—caught in the blades of a large motor boat. Is that right?” asked Amanda.

  “Yes,” said Remy.

  “Could she have died by any other means that you can think of?” persisted Amanda.

  “No, because there is no evidence of an intervening or contributing cause. The nature and pattern of her wounds are consistent with a boating accident. Even her beheading fits with that cause of death. In other words, she was not beheaded first and then dumped overboard and run over by a boat. And she didn’t drown first. The post-mortem findings just aren’t there. There was some water passively present in her lungs, but that would naturally occur when a body has been in the water for a while. And there was no anoxic cerebral injury.” Amanda looked puzzled. “Her brain was not deprived of oxygen as it would have been if she drowned,” Remy explained.

  “Oh,” said Amanda.

  “Also, I’ve just received the results of the blood tests from the toxicology lab. She had no recreational drugs or alcohol in her system when she died.” Remy hesitated for a moment and then said, “I do have another opinion that isn’t explicitly stated in the autopsy report.”

  “What is it?” asked Amanda.

  “I’ve noted that she was sexually active. That’s the clinical fact. What it hides is that our young lady had more pricks in her than a dive bar dart board,” said Remy.

  Amanda looked confused. “I don’t get it,” she said.

  “She displayed the physical evidence of an extensive history of sexually transmitted diseases.”

  “Oh,” said Amanda and, despite herself, blushed.

  Remy noticed but didn’t address her embarrassment. “I’ve not seen prostitutes with the long-term punishment she’s taken,” he continued.

  “You think she was a prostitute?” Amanda was stunned.

  Remy shrugged. “Maybe . . .”

  Chapter 5

  Callahan stood in the hallway outside the wall window of the Adult Daycare Center’s dining room and watched Max feed a wheelchair-bound guest. He spooned the pureed vegetables into the elderly woman’s open mouth and gently scooped what dribbled down her chin as she closed her mouth and swallowed. He then touched her lips with a cloth napkin. She smiled. Max smiled back and offered another spoonful to begin the cycle again. Callahan was charmed—there was no other word for it—by Max’s slow, deliberate caring and the bond it engendered between him and those he attended to at the Center.

  Julie had been a double surprise for Callahan, first popping up as the dispatcher at the station and then becoming much more. They had fallen in love, a circumstance that had been improbable and baffling for them both; and not the least because of Julie’s age and Callahan’s horrific disfigurement. But Max, her son, had been the astonishment for Callahan. Max had Down syndrome, but Callahan discovered that Max’s world was not shrunken by a hampered understanding of it. Instead, it was expanded by a selflessness unblemished by conceit or want. He was a revelation and a treasure.

  Callahan waited until Max finished feeding the woman and then entered the dining room and walked over to him.

  “You ready to go home?” he asked.

  The woman’s eyes widened and darted back and forth between Max and Callahan in an anxious quiver.

  “Adele needs to be in the lounge now. She likes to watch TV,” said Max.

  The woman relaxed and smiled.

  “Sure,” said Callahan. I’ll wait for you outside in the cruiser.”

  “Yes,” said Max.

  * * *

  “This isn’t the way home,” said Max. He was looking out the window of the cruiser, watching the landscape whiz by.

  “We’re going home but by a different way,” said Callahan. “I want to check something out first.”

  Max turned to Callahan. “What?” he asked.

  “Some people think they’re above the law and—”

  “What does that mean?” said Max, interrupting Callahan.

  “You say that about someone who believes they don’t have to follow rules or act in a way that is good for everyone, only for themselves. Do you understand?”

  “Mr. Fink is like that at the Center,” said Max.

  “Exactly,” said Callahan. “So, there is someone new on the island that I think is like Mr. Fink. I want to see if it’s true.”

  Callahan turned off Orchard Road and onto the gravel lane that led to Bland’s bunker. He braked to slow the cruiser, letting it grind over the drive at almost a snail’s pace.

  “You can help me,” said Callahan.

  Max sat up and slid his hands down the tops of his thighs. Then he looked at Callahan expectantly.

  Callahan swept his hand across the view outside the windshield. “The person who owns this land might be doing something here that he shouldn’t or allowing something to happen here that he shouldn’t. I need you to help me find out what that might be. Okay?”

  “Okay,” said Max, beginning to look around outside the cruiser’s window.

  Callahan pressed the button to lower the driver-side window and, as the window slid down, he heard the report of a rifle followed quickly by two others.

  “There,” said Max pointing straight ahead of him.

  Callahan stopped the cruiser. “Where?” he asked.

  “There,” said Max, his arm outstretched, pointing over the roof of the
low building in front of them.

  “I don’t see anything. What are you pointing at?” said Callahan.

  “There, over the trees,” said Max.

  Callahan followed the trajectory of Max’s finger and saw a stationary black spot against the blue of the sky just above the trees behind the bunker. The blot began to enlarge and become more defined as Callahan watched, mystified, until he realized it was coming toward them, not with the swoop of a flying bird, but straight and unwavering as if aimed at them. Just before it reached the cruiser, Callahan recognized it for what it was—a drone. It stopped and hovered a few feet from the windshield and then quickly rose and disappeared.

  “That’s not right,” said Max.

  “No,” said Callahan, “I don’t think it is.”

  Chapter 6

  “If the drone is Bland’s and if he is using it to hunt or to harass hunters, then he is breaking the law and could face jail time and a hefty fine. Michigan Compiled Laws Section 324 says exactly that.” Amanda tapped her computer screen and then pushed her chair back from her desk and turned to look up at Callahan.

  “That’s a string of ifs,” responded Callahan. “Let’s start with the hunting. What can be legally killed this time of year?”

  “Don’t have to look that one up. It’s open season year-round on coyote, feral swine, porcupine, opossum, weasel, and some common small birds. That’s about all you can legally hunt now, and you need a license for most even if you’re hunting on private property,” said Amanda.

  “July obviously isn’t trophy hunting month. Nothing in that list sounds valuable enough to risk using a drone to hunt.”

  “Unless he were hunting bigger game out of season,” said Amanda.

  “Another if,” said Callahan.

  “But you said you heard rifle fire,” said Amanda.

  “It sounded like it,” said Callahan, “but that doesn’t mean someone was hunting. Could have just been target practice.”