Page 49 of Silent Ridge

“I wasn’t issued any yet,” she says.

My fault. I should have asked this long ago. I’ll make sure we fix this today.

“I have an extra on the back seat. Put it on over your shirt.” I don’t really have an extra, but technically she’s still on light duty and isn’t supposed to be out in the field. If she gets killed, Sheriff Gray will be pissed at me.

Ronnie looks at me. “You aren’t wearing any.”

I’m tougher than you, I think.

“I have some in the trunk,” I lie like the expert I am. My mother taught me this. I didn’t learn how to sew or cook or iron. I learned how to lie. Thank you, Mom. This skill seems to come in handier than the others anyway. I can always follow a recipe to cook. Not so with telling a believable lie.

Ten minutes later, Ronnie has slipped on the vest and tightened the straps. We see a sign:

Historic Humes Ranch Cabin

5 mi.

And another sign:

ELWHA River Trail

3 mi.

Ronnie is on her phone, of course. “The Humes Ranch Cabin was built in 1900 by WilliamHumes. He was on his way to the Klondike but liked the area along the Elwha River so he and his brother settled there and built the cabin. It’s three miles from the Silent Ridge trailhead. Maybe we can stop by there on our way back to the office?”

I don’t say it, but I’m thinking,Maybe. If we’re still alive.

Forty-Five

I turn into the parking area for the trailhead and back into a space. There is one other car with no occupants in sight. I saw a couple of dirt roads angling off of the main road on the way but there are no signs or mailboxes. I imagine if anyone lives out in the sticks like this, they use a P.O. box in town.

I get on the radio and have Dispatch run the Oregon license plate of the other car in the lot. It comes back to someone with an Oregon address. It’s not stolen. I have Dispatch run the name for wants and warrants. No warrants and the license is clear. The plates come back to the correct vehicle.

“What now?” Ronnie asks.

“Wait here.” I get out and look around. Nothing but forest for as far as I can see. No noise that would indicate a human presence. I get back in the car. Damn. I didn’t really think it would be this easy, but I’m not looking forward to the long drive back. Still, I decide to check some of the side roads for signs of recent traffic. Maybe there are campgrounds or cabins that are unmarked?

I pull out.

“We’re going to check some of the side roads. You watch your side and I’ll check this one.”And look for someone holding a sign that says, “I’m a serial killer.”

I drive down one bumpy dirt side road after another and all roads end at a turnaround. I’m on my fourth road, if you can call a path of tire ruts through the grass a road, when I hit pay dirt. I slow and see a stump of a 4x4 wooden post that’s been sawed off six inches above the ground. This must have been for a mailbox or a sign marking the campsite.

The bark-and-cream-colored motor home is set back a couple of hundred feet from the road. The color blends with the trees and is almost hidden by towering red cedar and pine trees. If anyone is inside, they have seen me. So now I have two choices. I can drive on as if I’m out for a ride on a deserted side road in the middle of nowhere. Or I can stop down the road a piece and go to the door. If it’s not Rader’s place, I can tell whoever answers that I’m a lost hiker and ask for directions to the trailhead. If it’s Rader, I can ask for directions to the Monroe Correctional Complex and expect some fireworks. But I’m not really dressed like a hiker. I regret not getting Ronnie body armor before I left the office. But I’m here now and I don’t want to risk losing him.

“I’m going to check it out,” I say. “Stay here and cover me. If there’s shooting, call for backup.”

“I’m not staying here,” Ronnie says, getting out. “You don’t even have a vest, Megan. Do you?”

Okay, you go in front of me. Human shield.

“I’m going to knock,” I say. “Get back in the car. It’s an order.”

I hope he is smart enough to believe that we wouldn’t come to get him by ourselves. I hope he doesn’t know that I’m not that smart.

Ronnie stays with the car and I question my sanity as I walk down the rutted path that leads to the motor home. I’m extremely calm given the fact I might come face to face with a man who wants to kill me. The only downside of this is that if he’s home and I have to shoot him, Ronnie will see it all.

There are deep, wide tire tracks where the motor home was backed in, but they look old. There are several more narrow tracks, from car tires, criss-crossing the wider tracks. He’s brought a car too. Sensible. The motor home has been there awhile. A canvas rollout shade is extended by a door with a small set of metal steps. There is a small foldout picnic table and one stadium chair next to the side of the motor home. A charcoal grill is near this. No garden gnomes or lanterns strung up that would indicate an older couple. There are waffle-soled prints from heavy boots around all of this. The boot prints lead to the back of the motor home and I follow them. This is where the car was parked but it is gone now.

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